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THE BIBLE IN 
SHAKSPEARE 

A STUDY OF THE RELATION OF 
THE WORKS OF WILLIAM 
SHAKSPEARE TO THE BIBLE 

WITH NUMEROUS PARALLEL PASSAGES, QUOTA- 
TIONS, REFERENCES, PARAPHRASES and ALLUSIONS 

By WILLIAM BURGESS 

AUTHOR OF "LAY SERMONS FROM BIBLE AND SHAKSPEARE" 
"LAND, LABOR AND LIQUOR," ETC., ETC. 







THE WINONA PUBLISHING COMPANY 

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS WINONA LAKE, INDIANA 



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Copyright, 1903 
THE WINONA PUBLISHING COMPANY 



CONTENTS 



Author's Preface I. — Introductory v 

Author's Preface II.— Was Shakspeare a Christian ? vii 

Carlyle on Shakspeare as a Prophet xiv 



BOOK FIRST. — THE MINISTRY OP THE POET. 

I. — The Genius of Shakspeare 3 

II. — A Greater than Genius n 



BOOK SECOND. — SHAKSPEARE S BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS. 

I. — God in Shakspeare 19 

II. — Bible Characters in Shakspeare 23 

III. — Scripture Facts, Incidents, Places, Etc 25 

IV. — Shakspeare an Interpreter of Bible Words 27 

V. — Scripture and Shakspeare Parallels 32 



BOOK THIRD. — THE RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE. 

I. — Versatility of Shakspeare in the use of the Bible 51 

II. — Types of Character from Scripture 62 

III. — Heroes and Heroines 67 

IV. — The Moral Inculcations of Shakspeare 77 

V. — Tragedy in the Bible and in Shakspeare 87 

VI. — Religious Thought in the Plots of the Plays 94 

VII. — Shakspeare and Immortality 103 



BOOK FOURTH. — SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE. 

Moral and Religious Truths arranged in Cyclopaedic order 117-265 

BOOK FIFTH. — SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE. 

Shakspeare and Temperance 269 

General Index 279 

iii 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 
I 

The loss, by fire, of all the manuscripts of this work, together with the 
corrected proof-sheets, explains the delay of its publication so long after 
the date announced by advertisement and prospectus. On December 30, 
1902, the entire plant and buildings of the printing establishment having 
the work in hand, were totally destroyed on the eve of completing the 
proofs, together with my work of years. 

It became necessary therefore to prepare the matter again from par- 
tial copy, and notes in hand. The verification of the large number of 
references and quotations, a second time, entailed a great amount of 
labor, but the author hopes and believes that the work has not suffered 
in point of accuracy. 

The preparation of this work from the beginning, has been attended 
with a full share of author's troubles, the particulars of which, however, 
are not of general interest. 

No thought of publication was in mind when the study of the subject 
was entered upon twelve years ago. Certain platform utterances and 
magazine articles, as to the so-called "absence of religion in Shakspeare," 
attracted the author's attention and he found that there existed a rather 
general thought of the great dramatist as irreligious, or at least that his 
works indicate indifference to the subject of the Christian religion. 

These statements and opinions awakened an interest in the study as 
a matter of personal interest but the evidence against them was found 
to be so abundant and conclusive that it amounts to a revelation. More- 
over it did not appear that the subjects embraced in "The Bible in 
Shakspeare" were before the public, in any way available to the ordinary 
student or reader. 

The author is not vain enough to regard this work as the best that 
can be said or done upon the subject. It is quite likely that other minds 
may be turned in the same direction who will present further and more 
profound study. 

Already we have, in Denton J. Snider's Commentaries, a valuable 
contribution to the study of the moral questions involved in the great 
Shakspeare, and while we write these prefatory words another volume 



vi PREFACE 

comes to hand by Prof. Frank C. Sharp, of the University of Wisconsin, 
on "Shakspeare's Portrayal of the Moral Life." This book contains 
much that is valuable and interesting to the general study of the ques- 
tion stated in the title, but it seems to us that Prof. Sharp makes far too 
much of the absurdities of the stories of the Merchant oe Venice and 
other plays. No one cares to enquire closely into the reasonableness or 
otherwise of the story of "the pound of flesh" or the improbable condi- 
tions on which Antonio is alleged to have sought and found a loan of 
two thousand ducats. In studying the moral teachings of Shakspeare 
we do not concern ourselves about the fictions which he employed as the 
scaffolding from which to build his structure, any more than we stay to 
ask whether ^Esop's fables are facts, when we apply their moral. 

The reader is informed that the King James version of the Bible has 
been used in all Scripture quotations for this volume. There is no uni- 
form standard text of Shakspeare's works so that it may be found that 
some quotations differ a little from the versions in the hands of the 
reader. These differences, however, are not of sufficient importance to 
affect their general accuracy or value. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 
II 

WAS SHAKSPEARE A CHRISTIAN? 

It is not here intended to claim Shakspeare as a theological student, 
or that he ever set himself the task of propagating any set of religious 
doctrines. It is acknowledged that "he is the poet of secular humanity." 

Yet he did not treat sacred themes as distinct from the secular; but 
he saw the divine in the human, the spiritual in the secular and he made 
them manifest in his own great way, sometimes in glimpses, at others, 
in flames of light. 

It is claimed, however, that he drew largely from the Bible for his 
loftiest thoughts and noblest inspirations; that he employed Scripture 
teachings, facts, poetry, philosophy and language in his writings; that 
he was a sincere believer in the teachings of Scripture and that he 
accepted the orthodox views, current in his day, of the main doctrines 
of the Christian religion. 

These claims are established by a large number of affinities, allusions, 
references, paraphrases and quotations to Scripture text and teaching, 
which are taken from almost every part of Shakspeare's works. That 
these are not accidental, but bear the marks of design or purposed refer- 
ence, is beyond all doubt when their number, frequence and circum- 
stances are considered. These quotations are so accurate in spirit and 
application, the allusions so numerous and apposite, the historic refer- 
ences so varied and correct, that only one acquainted with the Scrip- 
tures could have so employed them. 

The question naturally arises ; — by what means did Shakspeare become 
so well versed in the Scriptures? 

In Shakspeare's time the Bible was the standard literature of his 
country. The time had passed away when "the translation and reading 
of the Bible in the common tongue" was treated as "heresy and a crime 
punishable by fire." It was no longer a forbidden book, but was the one 
book, almost the only book, within the reach of the common people. If 
Shakspeare had the advantage of any book in his early home that book 
was probably the Bible. Indeed it is probable that no other books were 



viii * PREFACE 

available to him, during his early days, except perhaps Plutarch and 
such glimpses of history and the classics, as he could obtain in his les- 
sons at school. 

Erasmus had said, only a few years before, "I long for the day when 
the husbandman shall sing portions of the Scriptures to himself as he 
follows the plough, when the weaver shall hum them to the tune of his 
shuttle, when the traveler shall while away, with their stories, the weari- 
ness of his journey." 

That time had come. The days of the Reformation were at hand. 
The poetry and the songs of the people were of the psalms and prophe- 
cies. The whole atmosphere of social, and even political life, was 
charged with the inbreathing of old testament law and of new testament 
gospel. 

The picture which Green has given us in his "History of the English 
People" graphically sets forth the marvelous relation which the Bible at 
that time sustained to the country : — " No greater moral change ever 
" passed over a nation. England became the people of a book and that 
" book was the Bible. It was as yet, the one English book that was 
" familiar to every Englishman ; it was read at churches and read at 
" home, and everywhere its words, as they fell on ears which custom had 
" not deadened to their force or beauty, kindled a startling enthu- 
" siasm. . . . No history, no romance, no poetry, save the little-known 
" verses of Chaucer, existed for any practical purpose in the English 
" tongue when the Bible was ordered to be set up in churches. Sunday 
" after Sunday, day after day, the crowds that gathered round Bonner's 
" Bibles in the nave of St. Paul's, or the family group that hung on the 
" words of the Geneva Bible in the devotional exercises at home, were 
" leavened with a new literature. Legends and annals, war song and 
" psalm, State-rolls and biographies, the mighty voices of prophets, the 
" parables of the Evangelists, stories of mission journeys, of perils by 
" the sea and among the heathen philosophic arguments, apocalyptic 
" visions, all were flung broadcast over minds unoccupied for the 
" most part by any rival learning. . . . But far greater than its effects 
" upon literature or social phase was the effect of the Bible on the char- 
" acter of the people at large. . . . The whole moral effect which is pro- 
" duced nowadays by the religious newspaper, the tract, the essay, the 
" lecture, the missionary report, the sermon, was then produced by the 
" Bible alone. And its effect in this way, however dispassionately we 
" examine it, was simply amazing. The whole temper of the nation was 
" changed. A new conception of life and of man superseded the old. A 
" new moral and religious impulse spread through every class. . . . The 
" whole nation became, in fact, a church." 



WAS SHAKSPBARB A CHRISTIAN? ix 

Now, when it is recalled that this great moral wave, under the influ- 
ence of the Bible, swept over the country during the period of Shak- 
speare's life and work, it will be easy to perceive that a wondrous daily 
flood of light and inspiration must have come to his mind from this 
source. 

But even this does not tell all the story. This period was the imme- 
diate forerunner of that splendid age of the Puritans which gave us 
Milton, Bunyan, Hooker and others, and which created an irresistible 
demand for an authorized version of the English Bible such as could be 
available and acceptable to the common people. 

The reign of Elizabeth was followed by James I and he was wise 
enough to appreciate the spirit of the times. He appointed a Counsel 
of the most learned scholars of the day, selecting them from the various 
schools of learning, and of the church, of whom the names of forty- 
seven are preserved to us. 1 

The work of translating the Bible was undertaken by this learned 
body in 1604 and concluded in 161 1. These, with the five years that 
followed, were the greatest of Shakspeare's life, during which he wrote 
his greatest dramas. He died in 1616. 

Thus, during all the period of his life, the Bible was the most popular 
theme of conversation and discussion, growing more and more, into 
general use and public esteem, until it became the most absorbing topic 
of political and general interest, culminating in the greatest and most 
abiding work of literary translation and study that has ever been given 
to the world. 

A Shakspeare who was not saturated with Bible idiom, language and 
thought, in such an age would be inconceivable. 

A perusal of the parallel passages in which, in this volume, Bible quo- 
tations are placed side by side with those from Shakspeare will show 
that, while very few texts are quoted verbatim, yet the use of biblical 
characters, facts, figures, doctrines and laws, in the author's own lan- 
guage, is so common as to constitute one of the most remarkable of the 
many marvels of Shakspeare. 

An English author of half a century ago writes as follows : — " In 
" storing his mind, Shakspeare went first to the word and then to the 
" works of God. In shaping the truths derived from these sources he 
" obeyed the instinct implanted by him who had formed him, — Shak- 
" speare. Hence his power of inspiring us with sublime affection for 
" that which is properly good and of chilling us with horror by his fear- 
" ful delineations of evil. Shakspeare perpetually reminds us of the 

1 Encyclopedia Britannica. Article on the English Bible. 






PREFACE 

" Bible. ... A passage, for instance, rises in our thoughts unaccom- 
" panied by a clear recollection of its origin. Our first impression is 
" that it must belong either to the Bible or Shakspeare. No other author 
" excites the same feeling in equal degree. In Shakspeare's plays relig- 
" ion is a vital and active principle sustaining the good, tormenting the 
" wicked, influencing the heart and lives of all." 1 

■ A more recently published work gives this : — "We believe that the 
" home education of William Shakspeare was grounded on the Bible, 
" and that if this Book had been sealed to his childhood he might have 
" been the Poet of nature, of passion, — his humor might have been as 
" rich as we find it and his wit as pointed, but that he would not have 
" been the Poet of the most profound as well as the most tolerant philos- 
" bphy ; his insight into the nature of man (his meanness and his gran- 
" deur, his weakness and his strength) would not have been what it is." 2 

Dr. A. H. Strong, Pres. Rochester Theological Seminary, says : — "I 
" challenge any man to find unbelief in the dramatis personae of Shak- 
" speare's plays, except in cases where it is the manifest effect or excuse 
" of sin, reproved by the context, or changed to fearful acknowledgment 
" of the truth by the results of transgression. In his ethical judgments 
" he never makes a slip ; he is as sure-footed as a Swiss mountaineer ; he 
" depicts vice, but he does not make it alluring or successful." 3 

And as to the personal faith of the Poet the same writer remarks : — 
" There is no trace of Mariolatry, nor of dependence for salvation upon 
" ritual and ceremony. ... In an age of much clerical corruption he 
" never rails at the clergy. While he has some most ungodly prelates 
" his priests are all a credit to their calling. None of his characters are 
" disseminators of scepticism. I cannot explain this except by supposing 
" that Shakspeare was himself a believer. Though he was not a theo- 
" logical dogmatist, nor an ecclesiastical partisan, he was unwaveringly 
" assured of the fundamental verities of the Christian scheme. Shak- 
" speare had dug down through superficial formulas to the bed-rock of 
" Christian doctrine. He held the truths which belong in common to all 
" ages of the church. If any deny the personality of God or the deity of 
" Christ, they have a controversy with Shakspeare. If any think it 
" irrational to believe in man's depravity, guilt, and need of supernatural 
" redemption, they must also be prepared to say that Shakspeare did not 
" understand human nature." 3 

The manuscript of the present volume was nearly completed when 
the author received the compliment of a presentation copy of a new book 

J " Shakspeare and the Bible." By Rev. J. R. Eaton, Norwich, England. 
2 "Shakspeare's True Life." By Major Walter. (Longmans, 1890.) 
3 The Great Poets and their Theology, pp. 210, 211. 



WAS SHAKSPEARE A CHRISTIAN? xi 

from London bearing the title of "The Christ in Shakspeare." The 
writer is a profound believer in the religious element in Shakspeare and 
especially in his Sonnets. He claims fifty of them as decidedly Chris- 
tian in spirit and teaching. He says : — "Some true poets have written a 
" few good hymns, yet amongst these none have succeeded in expressing 
" their thoughts with the felicity and strength of these glorious sonnets, 
" which harmoniously glow in perfect accord with the highest aspira- 
" tions, to the honor and praise of him who is above all. It is no fancy 
" but an admitted truth, that the spiritual mind of our author is brought 
" to light by the light of the Bible and his deep musings therein found 
" their delightful embodiment in a more poetic correspondence with one 
" or more earthly friends. . . . Although the Poet's primary aim was 
" not to display his spirituality to a general reader, if he ever pondered 
" such a thing, he had never the wish to hide from his friend, or from 
" anyone, the exalted views which he had derived from the study of the 
" Scriptures." x 

About the same time came another indication of the growing disposi- 
tion to interpret Shakspeare in the light of the Scriptures. The author 
of a pamphlet entitled "The Shakspearean Reconciliation" claims, in his 
thoughtful little treatise, that: — "Shakspeare's standpoint was a thor- 
" ough understanding of the Bible as it is beginning to be understood in 
" our days. The world in general, not being literary, has had to be 
" taught by a laborious criticism that the Bible is literature and not 
" science. Shakspeare recognized the poetry of the Biblical moralists 
" with the same sure-glance with which he recognized his own poetry. 
" In particular, in certain sayings of Christ, whence others drew dogma, 
" he could perceive at once poetical synthesis ; his own highest poetical 
" quality." 

The ordinary and natural reading of the Poet suffices to find religion 
in some way or other, breaking in at the most trivial incident and cir- 
cumstance, as well as in the more striking events and distinguished char- 
acters. The pious phrases of the times are constantly in evidence. 
Indeed, the frequent use of Scripture language and pious exclamations 
by the grossest and vilest of persons is somewhat shocking to our sense 
of reverence. And yet this is one of the surest marks of the Poet's 
familiarity with the Bible, as well as a true index to his apprehension of 
every variety of human society. 

That Shakspeare was a sincere believer in the Bible from which he 
drew so copiously, and in the doctrines taught therein, is a fact estab- 
lished beyond doubt. Pagan philosophy is, of course, fitly associated in 

1 " The Christ in Shakspeare." By Charles Ellis, London, 1897. 



xii PREFACE 

his dramas with the gods of its own creation. The Poet's works are a 
mirror of humanity and his pictures of heathenism are true to the sub- 
ject. 

But God was in his thoughts. He reverently acknowledges the God 
of the Bible in all His various attributes. He holds up to view the 
divine side of man. All his best men and women do homage to the 
Divine and his worst characters are shown to be in dread of the law of 
God and the ends of justice. 

God, as distinct from pagan gods, is mentioned in at least thirty of 
his thirty-seven plays and nearly seven hundred times. As many as 
forty different terms or exclamations are employed in his references to 
the Divine Being, most of which are taken from the Bible. These are 
given together with the Shakspearean text in the chapter on " God in 
Shakspeare." 

Frequent references are made to Jesus Christ as "Saviour," 
"Redeemer," "Lord" as may be seen in the chapter on "Scripture 
Themes." That these were in harmony with his own faith and not 
merely expressions accommodated to his characters is a necessary con- 
clusion on reading the following paragraph taken from the opening 
paragraph of the "last will and testament of William Shakspeare" : — 

"I commend my soul into the hands of God my Creator, hoping, and assuredly 
believing through the merits of Jesus Christ, my Saviour, to be made partaker of 
life everlasting." 

To this may be added the following from the Life of Shakspeare 
published in Knight's edition of his works : — "Whatever was the 
immediate cause of his last illness we may believe that the closing scene 
was full of tranquillity and hope ; and that he who had sought, perhaps 
more than any man, to look beyond the material and finite things of the 
world, should rest in the 'peace which passeth all understanding' in 
that assured belief which the opening of his will has expressed with far 
more than formal solemnity." 

In face of such testimony, he must be wilfully blind who will deny 
that this man spoke the language of his own heart and soul, when he, 
at various times and through various characters exclaims : — 

" The precious image of our dear Redeemer." 

" The world's ransom, blessed Mary's son." 

" By the death of him who died for all." 



WAS SHAKSPEARB A CHRISTIAN? xiii 

" I charge you as you hope to have redemption." 

" By Christ's dear blood shed for our grievous sins." 

" In those holy fields, 
Over whose acres walked those blessed feet 
Which fourteen hundred years ago, were nail'd 
For our advantage on the bitter cross." 

Thus it is seen that Shakspeare drank so deeply from the wells of 
Scripture that one may say, without any straining of the evidence, with- 
out the Bible Shakspeare could not be. And if it were possible to 
suppress every copy of the sacred volume and obliterate its very exist- 
ence as a book, the Bible in its essence and spirit, its great doctrines 
of infinite justice, mercy, love and redemption, as well as a vast store 
of its most precious sayings, would yet live in Shakspeare. 



Whoever looks intelligently at this Shakspeare may recognise that he 
was a prophet in his own zvay, of an insight analogous to the prophetic, 
though he took up another strain. Nature seemed to this man also 
divine; unspeakable, deep as Tophet, high as Heaven. "We are such 
stuff as dreams are made of!" That Scroll in Westminster Abbey, 
which fezv read with understanding, is of the depth of the sea. 

We may say without offense, that there rises a kind of universal psalm 
out of this Shakspeare, too; not unfit to make itself heard among the 
still more sacred Psalms. Not in disharmony with these, if zve under- 
stood them, but in harmony. I cannot call this Shakspeare a sceptic as 
some do; his indifference to creeds and theological quarrels of his time 
misleading them. No; neither unpatriotic, though he says little about 
his patriotism; nor sceptic, though he says little about his faith. 

"The Hero as a Poet." Thomas Carlyle. 



XIV 



BOOK FIRST 



The Ministry of the Poet 



/. THE GENIUS OF SHAKSPEARE 
II. A GREATER THAN GENIUS 



THE GENIUS OF SHAKSPEARE 

If Shakspeare were less than Shakspeare, the world would weary of 
his oft-repeated praises. As subject for essayist, poet or orator he is 
unequalled among men, save only, Jesus of Nazareth. 

No other literary work, the Bible excepted, can justify the many 
commentaries, concordances, essays and lectures which have evolved 
from the dramas and poems of the bard of the Avon. 

His genius is as a mountain which, like Mont Blanc of the Alps, 
overtops all others. But, for this very reason, he has often been viewed 
out of perspective. Perhaps, more frequently, the eye has been too much 
attracted toward some towering peak or projecting rock, to the exclusion 
of a more important or essential feature of the mountain. 

This may explain why it is that the recognition of the Divine Being, 
the profound reverence for the Saviour of men, the assumption of the 
fundamental doctrines of the Bible, the prophetic utterances on moral 
evils and social vices, the inculcation of Christian faith, practice and 
judgment, the frequent reference to and the dependence upon the 
Scriptures, — all so conspicuous and pervasive in Shakspeare, — are yet 
often ignored by literary critics, or treated with contempt by public 
teachers and lecturers. A prominent magazine writer tells us that 
"Shakspeare is remarkable among the poets for being without a phil- 
osophy and without a religion," x Is not this the expression of those 
who look, not too much, but too exclusively, upon the genius of the 
drama and so overlook its spirit and the sources of its inspiration? If 
Shakspeare be Shakspeare because of that transcendent genius which 
was in him like the " wind which bloweth where it listeth and thou 
nearest the sound thereof but canst not tell whence it cometh " it is yet 
true that great geniuses, like great planets, are lighted by other and 
sometimes lesser stars than their own. 2 

3 G. Santayana in "The New World," Dec, 1896. 

2 " Whether it was by accident, or in some happy hour, we know not, that Shak- 
speare in conning the manuscript of some wretched drama, felt the glorious 
impulse which prompted the pen to strike out whole passages, and to Interpol 
whole scenes : that moment was the obscure birth of his future genius. "Amen- 
ities of Literature," Disraeli, Vol. II, p. 193. 



4 THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

What may be called the " Mystery of Shakspeare " is one of the most 
interesting and also one of the most puzzling of literary problems. How 
can we reconcile what little is known of William Shakspeare with the 
present universal sweep of his fame and the acknowledged supremacy 
of his works in the world of literature? How can we recognize in the 
young man of Strat ford-on- A von, whose education was hardly up to 
the present day grammar school standard, the author of the thirty- 
seven great dramas, which, together with the poems constitute not 
only, one of the greatest, but the greatest works of literary art ever 
evolved from the mind of any one man ? How can we, in this twentieth 
century, acknowledge a strolling play-actor of three centuries ago, who 
never attained unto the literary circles of his own day, as the king whom 
we delight to crown the greatest of all in the literary world ? 

These questions stand in the light of the following facts : — 

(a) Not a scrap of all the original manuscripts of all the works that 
bear the name of Shakspeare is known to exist. 

(b) There is nothing in the records of Stratford-on-Avon, either in 
the local registers of events, in the records of the Courts or the Church, 
or in the known circumstances of the man to identify William Shak- 
speare with these works. 

(c) The only original document we have as unquestionably Shak- 
speare's is his "Will ;" yet this "Will" does not make the slightest allu- 
sion to the manuscripts or printed copies of these works, or to any value 
or interest that might accrue from them to his heirs. 

Briefly stated, this is the back-ground against which is thrown, the 
general announcement of the works which bear his name, as the prod- 
ucts of William Shakspeare. 

Against this back-ground, however, we are confronted with certain 
other facts, no less significant and still more definite and arbitrary. 

i. These works are here. The plays and poems which the literary 
world and the publishers of his times, or shortly after, by common con- 
sent accredited to Shakspeare and which have been generally accredited 
to him, for nearly three hundred years, are not myths but facts. They 
are in our possession, — treasures of incomparable value. The Tempest, 
Winter's Tale, Midsummer Night's Dream, Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, 
Macbeth, Caesar, Othello, Romeo and Juliet and the history plays of 
England : — all these are present day possessions. They are tangible 
and real, — the monumental mountains of some great genius, — an 
inheritance that wasteth not, is not subject to moth, or rust, or decay 
of time, but continues to grow like an eternal Banyan tree with multi- 
plying greatness and value. 



THE GENIUS OF SHAKSPEARE 5 

2. Nor are they a miracle. Great and superlative as they are, they 
do not belong to the realm of the supernatural. ' They are beyond all 
question, the products of human genius. " While they sometimes mount 
up as on the wings of eagles and soar to realms of fancy and vision, 
they take their flight, like the English lark, from the ground. They 
are of the earth, — earthy : of the human, — humanly. 

3. Nor are they of any other age than that attributed to them. No 
student of English history can, by any stretch of time or facts, place, 
these works in any other period than that of the last quarter of the 
sixteenth and the first quarter of the seventeenth century. 1 Any denial 
therefore of Shakspeare as the author of these works must substitute 
the name of some other genius of the same period of time. To do this 
does not seem to have occurred to the literary men who were con- 
temporary with Shakspeare, or who followed in a close line of sue-' 
cession. They had all the tradition and evidence of the times and, 
whatever else they thought of the plays, they regarded them, beyond 
doubt, as substantially the work of Shakspeare. Seven years after his 
death four booksellers formed a syndicate to publish an edition of the 
plays as the plays of William Shakspeare. Fifty years later Dryden 
mentions that " the plays of Shakspeare have become a little obsolete." 
For nearly a hundred years these plays lay almost wholly neglected 
" owing in part to the immediate revolution and rebellion and partly to 
the licentious tastes encouraged in Charles the Second's time and per- 
haps partly to the incorrect state of his (Shakspeare's) works." 2 At 
the expiration of this period a revival of literary interest again occurred. 1 
Samuel Johnson and Alexander Pope each wrote an extended preface 
to their editions of Shakspeare and while they, especially Johnson, 
criticised them severely, it did not seem to enter their minds that 
there could be any doubt as to the authenticity of the works in general, 
although they questioned many parts of them as Un-Shakspearian. 

1 " Shakspeare came at the last hour which could have made room for him;, 
twenty-five years later he would have been denied expression, or his free and, 
comprehensive genius would have suffered serious distortion. The loveliness of 
Milton's earlier lyrics reflect the joyousness and freedom of the golden age of 
English dramatic poetry. The Puritan temper was silently or noisily spreading! 
through the whole period of Shakspeare's career; within twenty-five years after 
his death it had closed the theaters and was making a desperate fight for the 
right to live according to conscience. Shakspeare arrived on the stage when 
the great schism which was to divide the English people had not gone beyond the 
stage of growing divergence of social and religious ideals; there was still a united 
England." " Shakspeare, Poet, Dramatist and Man." Hamilton W. Mabie. 

2 " Life of Shakspeare." By Dr. Alex. Chalmers, 1823. 



6 THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

The attempt, in recent years, to substitute the name of a scholar and 
a philosopher for that of Shakspeare as the author of these works has 
fallen and will soon be forgotten. A great scholar, like Bacon, could 
not have written these dramas even had he possessed the genius as well 
as the scholarship. .. As a scholar he could not have made the mistakes 
of Shakspeare. 

As to the absence of the' manuscripts, the perplexity is not removed 
but deepened, if it be deemed supposable that the works were written 
by Bacon instead of by Shakspeare. It is conceivable that a man of 
Shakspeare's habits and environment might place no value upon the 
written plays, except as stage property for which they were exclusively 
written. But we cannot conceive of a great scholar and philosopher 
working out from his intellectual consciousness so magnificent a work, 
as for example the play of Hamlet, without perceiving its literary merit 
and placing a value upon the manuscript for preservation and inher- 
itance. We can see why Shakspeare might attach no value to those 
manuscripts for his heirs but it is not supposable in regard to a man who 
appreciated his own literary attainments, who was in a position to esti- 
mate their future value and who was so careful of the fame and reward 
which his talents and labor might bring. 

Had Bacon written the masterpieces of poetic genius which are found 
in all the greater plays he could have found means to introduce them 
to his own world of literature and secure their recognition as such. 
But to Shakspeare this was a closed door. Plays written for the 
stage were not recognized in the realm of literature. When in 1586 
(or thereabouts) Shakspeare went to London he found many plays in 
the green-room of the theater. Mr. Mabie has told the story of the 
public attitude towards such plays so well that we take the liberty to 
quote him again : — 

"These plays were drawn from many sources; they were often composite; in 
many cases individual authorship had been forgotten, if it had ever been known ; 
no sense of personal proprietorship attached to them ; they belonged to the theater ; 
many of them had been revised so many times by so many hands that all 
semblance of their first forms had disappeared; they were constantly changed by 
the actors themselves. These plays were, in some instances, not even printed; 
they existed only as unpublished manuscripts ; in many cases a play did not exist 
as an entirety even in manuscript; it existed only in parts with cues for the 
different actors. The publication of a play was the very last thing desired by 
the writer, or by the theater to which it was sold and to which it belonged, and 
every precaution was taken to prevent a publicity which was harmful to the inter- 
ests of author and owner. The exclusive ownership of successful plays was a 
large part of the capital of the theaters. Shorthand writers often took down the 



THE GENIUS OF SHAKSPEARE 7 

speeches of actors, and in this way plays were stolen and surreptitiously printed; 
but they were full of all manner of inaccuracies, the verse passages readily 
becoming prose in the hands of unimaginative reporters, and the method was 
regarded as dishonorable. Reputable playwrights, having sold a work to a 
theater, did not regard it as available for publication." l 

This interesting page of history sufficiently explains the little esteem 
in which the manuscripts were held as literature. In view of all these 
considerations the wonder is, not that we know so little, but that we 
know so much of Shakspeare and his works. 

Here is the marvel ! Out of virgin soil there sprang one who, by his 
genius, unconsciously raised the whole stage-world unto the realm of 
literature. v The drama, in his hand, became the greatest expression of 
human life and experience. His works were the masterpieces of liter- 
ature. If the new intellectual world of his day was incapable of 
perceiving it, nevertheless it supplied the material and awakened the 
spirit that made a Shakspeare possible. "At the critical moment Shak- 
speare appeared as the Columbus of that new world. Pioneers had 
gone before and in a measure prepared the way, but Shakspeare still 
remains the discoverer, occupying a position of almost lonely grandeur 
in the isolation and completeness of his work." 2 

Whence then hath this man these great things? If he is the world's 
greatest literary fact, in what consists his superior power? 

There is one word which has been used of late in reference to Shak- 
speare and which is ascribed to him alone. It is the word "universality." 
Many men have done great things along some one line. They have 
shown themselves masters of some one form of art. To quote the words 
of an able writer "Rembrandt must teach us to enjoy the struggle of 
light with darkness, Wagner to enjoy peculiar musical effects ; Dickens 
gives a twist to our sentimentality, Artemus Ward to our humor; 
Emerson kindles a new moral light within us." 3 And it might be 
added, Mozart and Handel have taught us that religion may find its 
loftiest expression in music. Of many writers it has been said "that 
each did his own one thing better than any other " but, as Keats said of 
Shakspeare, "he did easily all men's utmost." 

This Shakspeare touches every shore of human experience. He appro- 
priates every element and product of nature, — all the trees and all the 
flowers and the birds of the air are his by acquaintance. Nothing 
escapes him. " He touched life at so many points and responded so 

1 Shakspeare, Poet, Dramatist and Man. 

2 Encyclopedia Britannica. Article on Shakspeare. 
The Will to Believe." William James. 



3 << 



8 THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

instinctively to every movement in the complex web of its throbbing 
activities, that nothing affecting humanity was alien either to his heart 
or brain." 1 

He is a naturalist, a scientist, a philosopher, a musician, a painter, an 
author, a historian, a physiologist, a psychologist, a physician, a lawyer, 
a mechanic, a theologian, — all in one. Yet he is none of these. By 
education and by profession he is nothing but a strolling play-actor ; yet 
by perception, by insight, by genius, he is everything human. 

Such genius is not a transient. Its works are not for to-day only, 
but for all time. They are not seen in their glory until time lends per- 
spective to the view. We do not see great things in the near view. We 
must lend distance to the mountain peak or we cannot see it. We must 
stand back if we would see a great picture. 

The universality of Shakspeare demands horizon. "Great authors 
have their place and day and evince more or less clearly marks of 
decline. Shakspeare is three centuries young and students are now 
examining his verse with renewed eagerness. . . In the classification 
of our English poets he must stand alone. There is none like him and 
the more we study him the more supremely he rises above the plane that 
others have reached." 2 " If the critics mention three poets of the first 
order, — Homer, Dante, and Shakspeare, — the greatest of these is the 
bard of Avon." 3 

Genius is not scholarship nor learning ; it does not discredit these but 
gladly welcomes them and employs them. But it rises above them, — 
sees beyond them. Its horizon is far away greater. It has no limita- 
tion. It soars to realms unknown ; imagination is its handmaid. It sees 
the mystic and revels in the supernatural ; it talks with ghosts and fairies 
and elves; and rides upon the air over all space. It discovers: — 

" — more things in heaven and earth 
Than are dream'd of in our philosophy." 

Great, indeed, is genius. It is far-seeing, prophetic ; it possesses eyes 
for depths, and distances, and darknesses ; it gives of its abundance, and 
the world is brighter for its vision. It is — 

" The celestial fire to change the flint 
Into transparent crystal, bright and clear." 

1 Encyclopedia Britanniea. Article on Shakspeare. 

J Prof. T. W. Hunt in Chicago Record Home Study Circle. 

3 Great Books as Life Teachers. Newell Dwight Hillis. 



THE GENIUS OF SHAKSPEARE 9 

It is a mighty force; a discoverer; a way out of the unknown, — 
through jungle and across the trackless ocean; it penetrates into 
mysteries of human physiology with Harvey ; it climbs the difficult way 
to the solar systems with Galileo ; it opens the cabinets of nature with 
Newton, and the world knows why an apple falls; or, with Watts, it 
discovers or reveals the utility of steam, and, with Franklin and Edison, 
of the electric forces. 

But it is not a creator. It is revelational, not creative. Its ministry 
is to discover and declare. It is prophetic rather than productive. 
" Shakspeare did not make types," said a certain orator ; no, but he 
discovered them. He found them and embodied them in living char- 
acters. Falstaff was a real flesh and blood creature of his age, a type 
of the fattened spawn of an idle, vile and sensual aristocracy. Shak- 
speare discovered him and, as a type, has made him immortal. Iago is 
the embodied type of a scheming traitor. Dogberry is the personifica- 
tion of ignorant officialism, " drest in a little brief authority," which 
intoxicates his infinitesimal brain. As types these are not created, but 
discovered and revealed, for all time. Dogberry is not dead : he exists 
in every village and may be found in the official sanctums of local coun- 
cils, great cities, State capitols and national governments. Scores of 
types were revealed by Shakspeare. No other genius (not even 
Dickens) ever, so plainly, portrayed the shams and bubbles and vanities 
of human beings. Herein was Shakspeare universal. Others, like 
Scott, Thackeray and Dickens drew their portraits of humanity, but 
they were local or provincial. Shakspeare's limit was the world. His 
characters are true to all time and his incarnated human traits grow 
with age. Hamlet, Macbeth, Caesar, Othello, Romeo and Juliet, Antonio 
and Shylock, do not crumble with age, as the statuary of a sculptor, 
but are imperishable pictures standing out upon the scroll of time, like 
living models for every school of human study. 1 

Nor is it true that genius is iconoclastic, as has been said of it in 
connection with Shakspeare. Genius and iconoclasm have no more in 
common than peace and war, or any other two opposite things. Genius 
is not an image-breaker, but an ideal-builder. Genius does not go with 
ax in hand to destroy the poor idols which men have made, but with 
magic fingers supplies new and better objects of beauty and adoration. 

1 " Of the scope of Shakspeare, I will say only, that the intellectual measure 
of every man since born, in the domains of creative thought, may be assigned 
to him, according to the degree in which he has been taught by Shakspeare." — 
Ruskin. 



io THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

Iconoclasm shatters with rude, unsympathetic hand the gods which 
human hearts have worshiped and leaves those souls in their darkness 
and despair. 

Genius sees that "there is no darkness but ignorance" (Twelfth 
Night 4:2), and proceeds to open the windows, that light may pour 
in from heaven, — that God may be seen by mortal eye. 

Iconoclasm enters the humble home and smashes the crude vases and 
weak imitations of the sculptor's art. 

Genius takes chisel in hand and brings the angel out of the rock, and 
welcomes all the world to revel in its beauty. 

Iconoclasm burns and destroys the cheap lithograph and gaudy 
chromo which relieve the monotony of cottage walls and gives nothing 
in its place. 

Genius transforms the shadows and multiplies art, that real pictures 
may be abundant and free as flowers in summer. 

Shakspeare was a genius, and therefore was not an Iconoclast. 

The ancient Greeks worshiped the sun as the greatest of all gods. 
The modern Greek says " there is nothing so great as genius." x Thus 
hero-worship deifies an attribute ; it glorifies a talent — physical or 
intellectual — and he who attains the highest point of that talent is its 
god. * To multitudes oi men there are no heroes but warriors of the 
battlefield or, perhaps, the prize-ring. The mighty products of Angelo's 
brain, or Rembrandt's soul, or Mozart's fire stir not their hearts. 

But genius, — like the sun, — sheds its radiant light upon all men 
without bargain and never waits for recognition. It gives of its 
affluence without price and is surprised at its own greatness. 

It is a quality of genius that it is not limited by the personality of 
the man. It rises above him, looks through him, sees beyond him, 
speaks by him. In his loftiest attainments the man of genius is often 
unconscious of his greatness. It is not necessary that the sun should 
be conscious of its own infinite resources and gifts. 

1 Robt. Ingersoll's lecture on Shakspeare. 



II 

A GREATER THAN GENIUS 

There is a greater than genius and that greater is — character. 

Emerson says: — "The purest literary talent appears, at one time 
" great, at another time small, but character is of a stellar and undimin- 
" ishable greatness. . . Character repudiates intellect, yet excites it ; and 
" character passes into thought, is published so, and then is ashamed 
" before new flashes of moral worth. Character is nature in its highest 
" form." 

Thus genius may shine through the soul and is sometimes reflected 
through character. But it may flash its light with surpassing brilliancy 
and yet not express character. The poets uttered great thoughts of fire 
which flamed forth as the illumination of a comet, but these thoughts 
were not always a reflex of their moral natures. 

Genius helps us towards perfection in all that is purely literary or 
artistic; it brings us the ideal in house-building and that is immeasur- 
able gain. But for infinite, eternal value, genius does not compare with 
that wealth which brings us a nobler sense of home-building and soul 
growth. 

" Men of character," says Emerson, " are the conscience of the society 
to which they belong. . . . Feeble souls never behold a principle 
until it is lodged in a person." What the world most needs and has 
always needed most is a " principle lodged in a person." For although 
we may see suggestions of principle in works of art, it is only as they 
represent the ideal that they are of actual value. The sculptor may 
bring forth from the marble block a human hand more perfectly formed 
than any hand we have seen, for it is a copy of the ideal hand, but it 
lacks flesh and blood and grip and grasp ; we are richer in the possession 
of the artist-made hand, but we are better for the hand that responds 
to ours with the grip of a personal friend. There is no soul behind the 
marble hand. 

It is no disparagement of genius to say that it cannot give peace to 
a single sorrowing soul, or rest to one sin-burdened spirit. Nor can it 
assure us of a moral purpose. All the genius of man cannot make a 
liar true or a moral leper clean. 



12 THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

These two, — Genius and Character, — are not in conflict ; they are 
not at war, the one with the other ; they are each of his own kingdom, — 
genius of intellect, — character of the heart. A great genius may be — 
as Shakspeare was — impersonal. He sends forth his radiant light 
unconsciously. He it is who " builded better than he knew." But a 
great character is never impersonal. 

It is claimed that Shakspeare's works are the most artistically beauti- 
ful of all the literary world and that it is the measure of their great 
value. But of yet greater value is a living character. By as much as a 
hand with a soul behind it is greater than a marble hand, so is character 
greater than genius. Of course genius may be associated with per- 
sonality, but the distinction is, that genius may be impersonal, character 
cannot be. Wherever greatness of character is, there is great per- 
sonality. In such there is eminent consciousness and there is also a 
living, vital touch of soul with soul. 

"A divine person is the prophecy of the mind ! A friend is the hope 
of the heart. Our beatitude waits for the fulfillment of these two in 
one. . . . There are many that can discern Genius on his starry track, 
though the mob is incapable ; but when that love which is all-suffering, 
all-abstaining, all-aspiring, which has vowed to itself, that it will be a 
wretch and also a fool in this world, sooner than soil its white hands by 
any compliances, comes into our streets and houses, — only the pure and 
aspiring can know his face, and the only compliment they can pay it, is 
to own it." — Emerson. 

There have been many men of great sacrificing love who were true 
to some one or more of the lines of this portrait ; but if we would know 
its original and only perfect embodiment, we must turn to that one who 
is the fulfillment of " the prophecy of the mind " and " the hope of the 
heart," he who said of himself " a greater than Solomon is here," he 
who constantly asserted himself by the most positive utterances of 
egoism, he who in word and in action is " self-sufBcingness," ..." the 
person who is riches " of whom, as Emerson says: "I cannot think as 
alone, or poor, or exiled, or unhappy, or client, but a perpetual patron, 
benefactor and beatified man." 

Such is he who makes no claim to genius and does not appeal to us by 
it, but always declares himself a supreme personality. " / am the way 
and the truth and the life." During all his active ministry and especially 
the latter period of it, Christ always proceeded upon the most lofty and 
supreme assumption of his own personal character. 



A GREATER THAN GENIUS 13 

Unlike Shakspeare, Jesus is always conscious and personal, and that, 
as we have seen, is the grand distinction between great intellect and 
great character. Character is essentially and intensely personal, genius 
is not. History furnishes abundant illustration of this. Moses, Elijah, 
Daniel and Paul were each intensely personal. Every great Reformer 
has been: — Cromwell, Luther, Savonarola, Wesley, Washington, Lin- 
coln. The missionary would be nothing without it. Livingston, Moffatt, 
Williams and Hudson preached and opened the ways of jungle and 
desert, not by force of intellect but by character. 

The philosophers are not so. Socrates depreciated himself and dis- 
counted his own personality. Christ, on the contrary, came to win men 
to himself as the very source and center of his gospel. Socrates cared 
nothing for loyalty to himself if only his disciples studied his philosophy. 
Christ demanded loyalty to himself as an essential test of discipleship, 
for he did not come to establish a system, but a kingdom. Socrates 
promoted science but was unable to offer a redemptive scheme for the 
spiritual woes and sins of humanity. Christ left science to others and 
gave Himself to the saving of man. Socrates died the death of a 
martyr, but his martyrdom is of little concern to the world, while his 
philosophy is much. Christ died a martyr's death and his death, even 
more than his life, changed the entire current of human affairs and, with 
his resurrection, is the supreme fact of Christianity. 1 

It matters little to the world whether or no Shakspeare wrote the 
works that bear his name, — their value does not depend upon his char- 
acter or personality. But it matters all whether or no Jesus be The 
Christ. 

Shakspeare's works are of priceless value but his name is no charm 
or power to redeem or transform men. He wrote from time to time 
the splendid thoughts which emanated from his surpassing genius and 
then fell back to the level of ordinary men. 

Christ spoke his grandest words without thought of editing or revi- 
sing them for publication ; but his life ever reached the highest mark of 
his teachings. He raised the standard of moral thought and deed so 
high that none of his followers ever attained its highest point, yet he 
himself never once fell below it during all his life of labor and depriva- 
tion and sacrifice. 2 

1 " If the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and death 
of Jesus are those of a God." — Rousseau, the French Sceptic. 

2 It is said that Charles Lamb in the course of a discussion with some literary 
friends remarked : " If Shakspeare were now to enter this room we should all 
stand up to do him honor; but if Jesus of Nazareth were to come in, we should 
all fall down and kiss the hem of his garment." 



i 4 THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

The world needs Christ, not simply for the gospels that record his life 
and teachings, but for Himself. The gospels that tell of him are of 
value beyond price, but what we need most of Jesus, — is Jesus. 

And that is true of every Saviour of men or nations. When a nation 
is in distress, or a people oppressed, it is the personal enthusiasm, the 
passion, the power, the leadership of a Statesman, a General, a Tribune 
that is needed; — a Moses, Washington, Garibaldi, Lincoln, Grant or a 
Gladstone. 

The world needs its Saviours, not for what they can say, but for what 
they are and do. When a heart is in distress or is held captive by some 
demon of sin it is not the philosophy or science of a scheme that can save 
but— a, SA VI OUR. 

He, therefore, who reveals a perfect personality and sustains it, is the 
ONE whom the world needs for its moral hunger and heart sorrows, — 
the supreme / AM who never fails to declare himself the essential per- 
sonal Life of the Kingdom of heaven. 

But such character knows no self. It is " all-suffering, all-abstaining, 
all-aspiring." Christ never once asserted himself for his own glory. 
In every self-announcement He proclaimed the advantage of others — 
not of himself. There is no record of his having once exercised his 
power or authority in which we can, by the most searching inquiry, 
discover a selfish purpose, or a means to promote his interests in society. 
We know of no miracle performed by him to contribute to his own com- 
fort, or to relieve his own needs in poverty, hunger, or weariness of 
body. His great grand infinite / AM'S were every one of them benevo- 
lent and gracious towards others. He never said, "I am divine, there- 
fore all men must concede to me." But he said " I am the Way " there- 
fore all men should " Come unto Me." All his invitations and announce- 
ments had the needs and sorrows of men in view : " Come," " weary," 
" burdened," " heavy laden," " I am the Door," " the good Shepherd," 
" the Vine," " the Way," " the Truth," " the Life ;" I tell you this 
because " no man cometh unto the Father but by Me." Blessed, glorious 
assumption of Jesus Christ ! the very essence of humility for it seeks not 
itself but others. 

Men are rarely, if ever self-sacrificial in their work from first to last 
and all through. Paul became so ! the Christian martyrs became so ! 
But from the beginning to the end Christ's life was wholly and entirely 
self-sacrificing and other-seeking. He moved, every hour of his life, 
towards the cross, and when he entered upon the active ministry for 
which he had prepared himself he bore the cross without cessation. " I 



A GREATER THAN GENIUS 15 

lay down my life for my sheep," he said and this he did, in living as in 
dying, never once faltering or excusing himself from the hardest task, 
the darkest Gethsemane, or the most self-forgetting labors. 

Men who have not understood this have wondered at his assumptions 
and self-assertions ; and yet the most severe and the most cynical of all 
critics have never witnessed against him a single act of self-seeking or 
self-interest. His self-giving is the most marvelous thing known to 
men. Never did he consult his own ease or necessities at the expense 
of human suffering ; never did he say to the needy or the distressed ; 
" Wait until I rest — come again to-morrow !" 

How vastly greater is such giving than is that, even of genius. It 
is the very gift of love and that is " the greatest thing in the world." 
Genius gives without stint or measure, but it brings no touch of love to 
the human heart. It cannot give rest or peace to its own most favored 
sons and daughters. The loftiest genius has ever needed a personal 
Saviour. Not a few of the most transcendent human intellects have 
dwelt in souls who have fallen " weary and heavy laden " — living and 
dying — moral wrecks and spiritual bankrupts. 

Poor Chatterton ! — prodigy of youthful genius, the wondrous boy- 
poet of more than a century ago committed suicide at the age of eight- 
een ; broken-hearted, he shut out the light of one of the brightest stars 
of genius that ever God gave to the race of men. He had found no 
heart-rest, he knew no infinite love, and hope perished within him. If 
ever a human spirit needed a personal saviour it was young Chatterton 
of whom Wordsworth wrote: — "The marvelous boy, the sleepless soul 
that perished in his pride." 

Perhaps the most fertile, and certainly one of the richest of American 
poets was Edgar Allan Poe. But the story" of the moral wreck of this 
gifted soul is painfully notorious. Surely Poe needed a saviour other 
than genius. 

Burns, the idol of Scottish hearts, the pride of the glens and groves of 
Ayrshire, author of the immortal " Cotter's Saturday Night," the bard 
of whom his biographers wrote, " he perished at thirty-seven, he can 
hardly be said to have died," was another example of the need of men 
of genius, as of other men, for a personal saviour. 

All the genius of the inimitable dramatic orator was in John B. 
Gough when he drifted down the moral plane until he fell into the very 
gutter of human society, a mere saloon clown. 

But Gough was transformed by a power greater than genius. 
Personal kindness, human sympathy, love incarnate, touched his heart 



16 THE MINISTRY OF THE POET 

an d — behold ! the dead was awakened, the resurrected man came forth. 
And when his star of genius was set in a moral firmament, inspired by- 
divine love, he transported millions by the story of his own redemption. 

And that is it. Genius is wealth, a mine of great riches, a constella- 
tion of light and beauty and power. But it needs love, the vital essence 
of character to complete it, to guide it, to inspire it, and to redeem its 
prophets. 

This is the incarnation, the vital personal energy to redeem the world, 
to direct genius, to qualify teachers, to ennoble life, to purify society, 
to exalt government, to advance the truest and highest and best civiliza- 
tion, — to redeem the world. 

It is going on, — this incarnation, — the Christ spirit, — manifesting 
itself in various ways, breaking the horizon, broadening the view, bring- 
ing the world into touch with the world and with God, making the 
sentiment of universal peace and brotherhood a fact, converting all man- 
kind into one family, one in Christ — one in Love — one in Sympathy. 

Herein is true greatness. Greatness that never falters, that " will be 
a wretch and also a fool in this world sooner than soil its white hands 
by any compliances," — that gives itself to a sinful world in purity, in 
love, in sacrifice. 

What, if it were possible, that this infinitude of the personal Christ 
could cease? Shakspeare's work of genius itself could hardly sustain 
the shock. So much of his glory does he borrow from the inspiration 
of that life, so much does he depend for abiding fame and increasing 
appreciation upon Him of whom he wrote : — 

" In those holy fields 
Over whose acres walked those blessed feet 
Which, fourteen hundred years ago were nail'd 
For our advantage on the bitter cross." 



BOOK SECOND 



Shakspeare's Biblical Translations 



/. GOD IN SHAKSPEARB 
II. BIBLE CHARACTERS 

III. SCRIPTURE FACTS, INCIDENTS 

PLACES, ETC. 

IV. SHAKSPEARE AN INTERPRETER 

OF BIBLE WORDS 

V. SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPEARE 
PARALLELS 
2 



17 



GOD IN SHAKSPBARB 

It is strange that so many literary men have been blind, — not only 
to the spiritual or religious element in Shakspeare, but also to the actual 
facts of his frequent use of Scripture and of references to the Divine 
Being. The most extraordinary instance of this blindness is that of 
Michelet, the French author, who is credited with saying: — "As far as I 
recollect, the name of God does not occur in Shakspeare, or if it does, 
it is rarely, or by chance and unaccompanied by the shadow of a 
religious sentiment." 1 

It seems incredible that any reader of the great Poet's works, to say 
nothing of an author who ventures to write upon them, should be guilty 
of such a statement. Either the memory of Michelet is very treacherous 
or he must have closed his eyes — we had almost said wilfully — to the 
overwhelming facts which are set forth in this chapter. 

The Divine Being is referred to in all parts of the works of Shak- 
speare, and under many different Scriptural or reverential terms. 

The use of the word " God " as applied to the God of the Bible is 
distinguished from references to pagan " gods " by the use of the capital 
letter in all editions of his works. Sometimes it is employed as an 
exclamation, as " O God !" or " God's will ! " and is not always, in such 
cases, accompanied with any religious thought, but in the great majority 
of instances the word is employed with a religious meaning and with 
reverence. 

This word " God " is found in the various dramas nearly seven hun- 
dred times. This number varies a little in different editions but not 
sufficiently to affect the figures materially. 

As Mrs. Cowden Clarke points out " the word Heaven is frequently 
substituted for this word (God) more especially in the historical 
plays." 2 

The following table of the number of times the word (God) is used 
in the text of Knight's edition may be taken as substantially correct : — 

'John Taylor in Shakspeariana, November, 1889. 
2 Clarke's Concordance to Shakspeare. 

19 



20 BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 

Richard III. contains the word God, 1 99 times ; 

Much Ado about Nothing, 59 ; 

II Henry VL, 58; I Henry VI., 25; III Henry VI., 30; 

Henry V., 58; I Henry IV., 36; II Henry IV., 26; 

Richard II., 44 ; Henry VIII., 32 ; Hamlet, 27 ; 

Romeo and Juliet, 31 ; Love's Labor Lost, 26; 

As You Like It, 20; All's Well that Ends Well, 19; 

Merchant of Venice, 18; Taming of Shrew, 18; 

Twelfth Night, 14; Macbeth, 14; Othello, 5; 

Comedy of Errors, 2 13 ; Titus Andronicus, 2 6 ; 

King John, 6 ; Pericles, 4 ; Coriolanus, 2 ; 

Midsummer Night's Dream, 5 ; Merry Wives, 2 ; 

Troilus and Cressida, 1 ; King Lear, 1 ; 

Antony and Cleopatra, 1. 

The following terms of reverence, or exclamations, having reference 
to the Supreme Being are found in the texts of the plays given : — 

God Above. Macb. 4:3. 

God Almighty. Hen. V. 2 : 4 ; 4 : 1 ; II Hen. VI. 2:1. 

God before — in the sense of God leading. Hen. V. 3 : 6. 

God befriend us. I Hen. IV. 5:1. 

God be praised. Hen. V. 4: 7. II Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

God Himself. II Hen. VI. 4 : 2. 

God help. I Hen. IV. 2 : 4. 

God defend the right. II Hen. VI. 2 : 3. 

God forgive (thee). I Hen. IV. 1 : 2. 

God forgive (me) (them). I Hen. IV. 1:3. I Hen. IV. 3:2. II 
Hen. VI. 3 : 3. 

God forbid. Much Ado 1:1. Mer. of Ven. 2 : 2. Tarn. Shrew 4 : 2, 
5:1. Rich. 11. 2: 1, 4: 1. I Hen. IV. 5:2. Hen. V. 1 : 2. II Hen. 
VI. 3:2, 4:4. Ill Hen. VI. 1:2; 2:1; 3:2:4:1; 5:4. Hen. VIII. 
2 : 2. Rom. and Jul. 1 : 3. Titus And. 4 : 3. 

God keep me so. Hen. V. 4 : 7. 

God knows. I Hen. IV. 2 : 1. I Hen. VI. 5 : 1. II Hen. VI. 1 : 2, 
2: 1,3:2, 5:2. 

1 Mrs. Cowden Clarke gives the word in Richard III. ninety-seven times. 

* In these plays the word is used much more frequently in the plural and with- 
out the capital, but these numbers must be understood as referring to the word 
in the Christian sense. 



GOD IN SHAKSPBARE 21 

God of battles. Hen. V. 4 : 1. 

God's majesty. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

God our hope. II Hen. VI. 2:3, 4:4. 

God save. I Hen. IV. 1 : 2. 

God speed. I Hen. VI. 3 : 2. 

God's Will, God's Peace. Hen. ^4:3. 

O God ! Rich. III. 4 : 4. Ham. 1 : 2. Hen. V. 4 : 8. Ill Hen. VI. 
5:6. II Hen. VI. 2:1, 3:3. 

Great God of Heaven. Rich. III. 5 : 4. 

God Omnipotent. Rich. II. 3 : 3. 

If God please. Hen. V. 4: 3. 

Heaven 1 (as God). All's Well 2: 1. Rom. and Jul. 4:5 (twice). 
Rich. III. 5:3. Hen. VIII. 3:1. Rich. II. 5:2; 3:2; 3:3; 1:2 
(twice). 

Maker — " praise my Maker." Hen. VIII. 3 : 2, 5 : 4. 

All Seer. Rich. III. 5 : 1. 

Eternal God. II Hen. VI. 1 : 4. 

The Everlasting. Ham. 1 : 2. 

The most just God. Peri. 5:1. 

The Widow's Champion and Defense. Rich. II. 1 : 2. 

Thee. ^ Hen. VI. 2 : 3. 

Eternal Mover of the Heavens. II Hen. VI. 3 : 3. 

King of Kings and Lord of Hosts. I Hen. VI. 1:1. Rich. III. 1 : 4 
and 2:1. 

King's King. Rich. III. 4:4. 

King of Heaven. Rich. II. 3 : 3. Rich. III. 1 : 2. 

He that wears the crown immortally. II Hen. IV. 4 : 4. 

Him that all things knows. All's Well 2:1. 

Him that made me. I Hen. VI. 2 : 4. Ill Hen. VI. 2 : 2. 

He of greatest works. All's Well 2:1. 

His minister. Rich. II. 1 : 2. 

Lord; O, Lord. Rich. II. 3:2; Hen. V. 4: 1. II Hen. VI. 1:1; 
2:1, and 2: 3. 

O Thou. Rich. III. 5:3. II Hen. VI. 3 : 2. 

Judge. Hen. VIII. 3: 1. 

Providence. Tempest 1 : 2. 

J The word "Heaven" in the texts given above is used with the meaning of 
"God" or "Supreme Being." Shakspeare uses the word many other times with 
the meaning of good or high influences. 



22 BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 

Shakspeare makes reverent use of the word "Almighty " six times 
and the word " Christ " is, nine times, fitly and reverently quoted. 
The Latin (Jesu) for Jesus is not always fitly spoken: On fourteen 
occasions it is used as an exclamation and hardly with reverence. 
" Redeemer " is twice used in Rich. III. The " Holy Ghost " is never 
mentioned in Shakspeare, a fact attributed to the Poet's sense of rever- 
ence for that name, and the word "Saviour" is mentioned only once, 
viz.: in Ham. 1:1. 






II 

BIBLE CHARACTERS 

Adam. I Hen. IV. 2 : 4 and 3 : 3. Hen. V. 1 : 1. II Hen. VI. 4 : 2. 
Ham. 5:1. Love's Labor 4:2; 5:2. Much Ado 2 : 1 (twice) . Rich. 
II. 3:4. As You Like It 2: 1. Com. of Err. 4: 3. 

Eve. Love's Labor 1 : 1 ; 5 : 2. Rich. III. 3 : 4. Twelfth Night 1 : 5. 
Two Gent. 3:1. Merry Wives 4: 2. Sonnet 93. 

Abel. Rich. II. 1 : 1. I Hen. VI. 1 : 3. 

Cain. I Hen. VI. 1:3. II Hen. IV. 1 : 1. Ham. 5:1:3:3. Rich. 
II. 5:6. K. John 3 : 4. Love's Labor 4 : 2. 

Noah. Com. of Err. 3 : 2. Twelfth Night 3 : 2. 

Japheth. II Hen. IV. 2 : 2. 

Abraham. Mer. of Ven. 1 : 2; 1 : 3. Rich. II. 4: 1. Rich. III. 4: 3. 

Hagar. Mer. of Ven. 2 : 5. 

Jacob. Mer. of Ven. 1 : 2 (five times) 52:5. 

Laban. Mer. of Ven. 1 : 3 (twice). 

Pharaoh. I Hen. IV. 2 : 4. 

Pharaoh's Soldiers. Much Ado 3 : 3. 

Joshua. Love's Labor 5:1. 

Deborah. I Hen. VI. 1 : 2. 

Jephthah and his daughter. Ham. 2: 2 (twice). III. Hen. VI. 5 : 1. 

Samson. I Hen. VI. 1 : 2. Hen. VIII. 5 : 3. Love's Labor 1 : 2 
(five times). 

Goliath. Merry Wives 5:1. I Hen. VI. 1 : 2. 

Jezebel. Twelfth Night 2 : 5. 

Job and Job's wife. Merry Wives 5:5. II Hen. IV. 1 : 2. 

Solomon. Love's Labor 1 : 2 and 4: 3. 

Sheba (Saba). Hen. VIII. 5:4. 

Daniel. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1 (three times). 

Nebuchadnezzar. All's Well 4: 5. 

Jesus. Rich. III. 5 : 3. Ill Hen. VI. 5 : 6. 

Christ (Master). Rich. II. 4: 1. Rich. III. 1:4. II Hen. VI. 5:1. 
I Hen. IV. 1 : 1 ; 3 : 2. Hen. V. 4 : 1. I Hen. VI. 1 : 2. 

Mary (Mother of Jesus). Rich. II. 2: 1. Hen. VIII. 5:1. I Hen. 
VI. 1 : 2. 

23 



24 BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 

Herod. Hen. V. 3:3. Ham. 3:2. Merry Wives 2:1. Ant. and 
Cleo. 1:2; 3:3; 4:6. 

The Nazarite. Mer. of Ven. 1 : 3. 

Twelve Apostles. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Judas. Rich. II. 3:254:1. Ill Hen. VI. 5 : 7. Love's Labor 5 : 2 
(seven times). As You Like It 3:4. 

Judas Maccabeus. Love's Labor 5:155:2. 

Barrabas. Mer. of Ven. 4:1. 

Lazarus. I Hen. IV. 4 : 2. 

Dives. I Hen. IV. 3 : 3. 

Pilate. Rich. II. 4: 1. Rich. III. 1 : 4. 

Prodigal x Son. I Hen. IV. 4 : 2. Merry Wives 4:5; Winter's Tale 
4:2. II Hen. IV. 2: 1. 

Peter (St. Peter). Much Ado 2:1. Two Gent. 2:3. Twelfth 
Night 3:1. Othello 4 : 2. 

Paul 2 (Saint) (Apostle). Rich. III. 1:2; 1:3; 3:4; 5:3. 

St. Phillip's daughters. I Hen. VI. 1 : 2. 

Satan. Com. of Err. 4:354:4. I Hen. IV. 2 : 4. Merry Wives 5 : 5. 
All's Well 5 : 3. 

The Devil. 3 Ham. 2:253:1. Mer. of Ven. 1:3; 2:2. Rich. III. 
1:2; 1:3. 

Belzebub. Twelfth Night 5:1. Hen. V. 4:7. Macb. 2:3. 

Lucifer is once mentioned in the Bible Isai. XIV. 12 and Shakspeare 
uses the word with a similar meaning in Hen. VIII. 3 : 2. Hen. V. 4 : 7. 

1 These references are of course to the story known as "The Prodigal Son," 
but the word " prodigal " is not found in the Scriptures. 

2 Saint Paul in Richard III. is several times used in reference to St. Paul's 
Cathedral. 

3 The word "devil" is used many times as an epithet to express devilish char- 
acter, or in slang and oaths. 



Ill 

SCRIPTURB FACTS, INCIDENTS, PLACES, ETC. 

Lights Created. Tempest i : 2. 

Fall of Man. Hen. V. 2 : 1 and 2:2. I Hen. IV. 3:3. As You 
Like It 2: 1. 

Adam's transgression. Much Ado 2:1. 

Adam a gardener. Ham. 5:1. II Hen. VI. 4: 2. 

Eden. Rich. II. 2: 1. 

Birth of Cain. K. John 3:4. II Hen. IV. 1:1. 

Cain as a murderer. I Hen. VI. 1:3. II Hen. IV. 1 : 1. 

Abel murdered. Ham. 3 : 3. Rich. II. 1:1. I Hen. VI. 1 : 3. 

The Flood. As You Like It. 5 : 4. Com. of Err. 3 : 2. 

Bosom of Abraham. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Egyptian darkness. Twelfth Night 4 : 2. 

The lean kine. I Hen. IV. 2 : 4. 

Firstborn of Egypt. As You Like It. 2 : 5. 

Pharaoh's Soldiers. Much Ado. 3 : 3. 

The ten commandments. Ham. 5:1. I Hen. VI. 1:3. Meas. for 
Meas. 1 : 2. 

Law of Inheritance. Hen. V. 1:2. 

Jephthah's sacrifice of his daughter. Ill Hen. VI. 5: 1. 

Patience of Lot. II Hen. IV. 1 : 2. 

Nebuchadnezzar's Fall. All's Well 4 : 5. 

The hill of Bashan. Ant. and Cleo. 3 : 2. 

Herod's slaughter of infants. Hen. V. 3 : 3. 

Blind man healed. II Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

Prodigal Son. (See Bible Characters.) 

Calf killed for Prodigal's feast. Com. of Err. 4 : 3. 

Devil's entering swine. Mer. of Ven. 1 : 3. 

Betrayal of Jesus. Rich. II. 4: 1. (See Judas.) 

Pilate's handwashing. Rich. II. 4: 1. Rich. III. 1 '.4. 

Crucifixion of Christ. I Hen. IV. 1:1. 

25 



26 BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 

Field of Golgotha. Rich. II. 4 : 1 ; 4 : 2. Macb. 1 : 2. 
Sepulchre of Christ. Rich. II. 2:1. I Hen. IV. 1 : 1. 
Jerusalem. K. John 2:2. I Hen. IV. 1 : 1. II Hen. IV. 4:4. Ill 
Hen. VI. 5 : 5. 

The Holy Land. Rich. II. 5:6. II Hen. IV. 4 : 4. 
Miracles. Hen. V. 1:1. 



IV 



SHAKSPEARB AS AN INTERPRETER OF BIBLE WORDS 

The dramatic and poetic works of Shakspeare furnish one of the best 
aids to a correct interpretation of the meaning of many words and 
phrases in the English Bible which are difficult, or obscure, when viewed 
in the light of modern standards of the English language. 

The writings of Shakspeare extended over a period of twenty-four 
years ranging from a. d. 1587 to 161 1. The King James translation of 
the Bible was begun in 1604 and completed in 161 1. 

Thus our common version of the Bible was translated during the 
latter part of the period in which the great dramatist wrote. The trans- 
lators would naturally use English words in the sense employed by the 
leading writers of the age, and of all writers, Shakspeare was the most 
likely to employ the colloquial tongue of his time and country. 1 

Our English Bible, therefore, may be used as a student's guide to 
certain forms of expression found in Shakspeare and likewise Shak- 
speare may be profitably studied for interpretation of many words in the 
Bible. 

It is claimed for the King James version of the Bible that one reason 
why it " gives such general satisfaction to the English ear is that it 
speaks a language of its own which is conventionally received as a 
Biblical tongue." 2 

This remark may be applied to many of the finer passages of Shak- 
speare's dramas ; indeed the Poet is never so grand as when he 
approaches the style of Biblical poetry and it is a matter of common 
observation that many passages of his works are often quoted, by 
mistake, as from the Bible itself. 3 

The Commissioners appointed by King James to translate the Bible 
also acquired the same lofty Biblical style of expression — the same use 

1 " If we except the translators of the Bible, Shakspeare wrote the best Eng- 
lish that has yet been written. . . Writing for the general public, he used such 
language as would convey his meaning to his auditors — the common phrase- 
ology of his period." — Richard Grant White. 

"Ency. Brit., Vol. 8, p. 389. 

8 See quotation from " Shakspeare and the Bible " in preface. 

27 



28 BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 

of language which marks it as distinct from the ordinary -forms of 
literary English. The preface published in all editions of our common 
version was the work of that large and learned body of divines. As 
we read through this most interesting and instructive document we 
might easily imagine it the utterance of one of Shakspeare's loftiest 
characters. 

Illustrating the striking similarity in the use of common words, as 
found in the Bible, and in the works of Shakspeare, the following 
selected passages will be of service. The words are given from the 
text of the Bible and also of Shakspeare : — 

ABJECTS in the sense of vile, mean persons. 

Yea, the objects gather themselves against me. Ps. xxxv. 15. 
We are the Queen's objects and must obey. Rich. III. 1:1. 
Me, as his abject object. Hen. VIII. 1:1. 

ALLOW— approve. 

That ye allow the deeds of your fathers. Luke xi. 48. 
That which I do I allow not. Rom. vii. 15. 
As we were allowed of God. I Thess. ii. 4. 

Generally allowed for your many warlike preparations (qualities). Merry 
Wives 2:2. , 

I like them all to do allow them well. II Hen. IV. 4: 2. 
Praise us as we are tested. Allow us as we prove. Troi. and Cres. 3: 2. 

BEWRAY — disclose, betray. 

Thy speech bewrayeth thee. Matt. xxvi. 73. 

— he * * bewrayeth it not. Prov. xxix. 24. 

— which bewrayeth itself. Prov. xxvii. 16. 

And state of our bodies would bewray what life 

We have led since thy exile. Corio. V. 3. 

The Queen whose looks bewray her anger. 777 Hen. VI. 1 : 1. 

And not bewray thy treason with a blush. Ill Hen. VI. 3: 3. 

BRAVERY — vanity, pride of dress. 

The bravery of their tinkling ornaments. Isai. Hi. 18. 
His bravery is not on my cost. As You Like It. 2: 7. 
Scarfs and fans and double change of bravery. Tarn. Shrew. 4: 3. 

BESTOW — put away, or lay up. 

There will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. Luke xii. 18. 
We will bestozv you in some better place. I Hen. VI. 3: 2. 
I will bestow you where you will have time 
To speak your bosom freely. Oth. 3: 1. 

CAREFUL — anxious. 

Be careful for nothing. Phil. iv. 6. 

O full of careful business are his looks. Rich. II. 2: 2. 



BIBLE WORDS INTERPRETED 29 

CARRIAGE — baggage or luggage. 

We took up our carriages and went to Jerusalem. Acts xxi. 15. 
Many carriages he hath despatched. King John 5: 7. 

CASTAWAY — lost, cast-off. 

Lest * * I myself should become a castaway. I Cor. ix. 27. 
Why do you look on us and shake your head, and call us orphans, 
wretches, castaways. Rich. III. 2: 2. 

CLEAN — completely, entirely. 

Is his mercy clean gone forever. Ps. Ivii. 8. 

Roaming clean through the bounds of Asia. Com. of Err. 1: I. 

Clean from the purpose of the things themselves. Jul. Caes. 1:3. 

CHARITY — love. 

Now abideth faith, hope, charity. I Cor. xiii. 13. 

For charity itself fulfils the law 

And who can sever love from charity. Love's Labor 4: 3. 

CHOICE — select, excelling. 

A choice young man and a goodly. I Sam. ix. 2. 
The choice and master spirits of this age. Jul. Caes. 3: 1. 

CONVENIENT — suitable, seemly. 

Feed me with food convenient for me. Prov. xxx. 8. 
To do those things which are not convenient. Rom. i. 28. 
As shall conveniently become you there. Mer. of Ven. 2: 8. 
All that honor that good convenience claims. All's Well 3: 2. 

CUNNING — skill or skillful. 

Let my right hand forget her cunning. Ps. cxxxvii.. 5. 
Send me a man cunning to work in gold. 77 Chron. ii. 7. 
To our sports my better cunning faints. Ant. and Cleo. 2: 3. 
To cunning men I will be kind and liberal. Tarn. Shrew. 1: 1. 

DAMNATION — condemnation, judgment. This word and the word "damn" 
are frequently used both in Bible and Shakspeare in this sense. 
Ye shall receive the greater damnation. Matt, xxiii. 14. 
Author of the servants' damnation. Hen. V. 4: 1 

EAR — plough or till. 

He will set them to ear his ground. / Sam. viii. 12. 

Let them go to ear the land. Rich. II. 3: 2. 

He that ears my land spares my team. All's Well 1: 3. 

FAIN — glad, or gladly. 

He would fain have filled his belly. Luke xv. 16. 

To my thinking he would fain have had it. Jul. Caes. 1: 2. 

FAVOR — countenance, looks. 

Rachel was beautiful and well favored. Gen. xxix. 17. 

I know your favor well, 

Though now you have no sea-cap on your head. Twelf. Night. 3: 4. 

A shrew, ill-favored wife. Tarn. Shreiv 1: 2. 



3 o BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 

GOOD-MAN — head of house. 

The good-man is not at home. Prov. vii. 19. 

To the good-man of the house. Mark xiv. 14, Luke xxii. 77. 

This story shall the good-man teach his son. Hen. V. 4: 2. 

LEASING — lying or deceiving. 

Thou shalt destroy them that speak leasing. Ps. v. 6. 

How long will ye seek after leasing. Ps. iv. 2. 

In his praise have almost stamped the leasing. Corio. 5: 2. 

LET — hinder. 

Only he who now letteth will let. II. Thess. ii. 7. 
If nothing lets to make us happy. Twelf. Night 5: 1. 

MAID-CHILD — female. 

But if she bear a maid-child. Lev. xii. 5. 
She brought forth a maid-child. Peri. 5: 3. 

MAN-CHILD — male. 

If a woman have born a man-child. Levi. xii. 2. 
Hearing he was a man-child. Corio. 1:3. 

PASSION — suffering. 

He showed himself alive after his passion. Acts i. 3. 
You shall offend him and extend his passion. Macb. 3: 4. 

PROPER — handsome, fair. 

Because they saw he was a proper child. Heb. xi. 23. 

A marvelous proper man. Rich. III. 1: 2. 

He is a proper man's picture. Mer. of Ven. 1: 2. 

QUARREL — cause. 

That shall avenge the quarrel of my covenant. Lev. xxvi. 25. 
And since the quarrel will bear no color. Jul. Caes. 2: 1. 

QUICK — alive, living. 

And they go down quick into the pit. Num. xvi. 30. 
The word of God is quick and powerful. Heb. iv. 12. 
That which thou sowest is not quickened except it die. / Cor. xv. 36. 
Who shall judge the quick and the dead. // Tim. iv. I. 
Now pile your dust upon the quick and the dead. Ham. 5; 7. 
The mercy that was quick in us but late. Hen. V. 2: 2. 
Thou'rt quick. But yet I'll bury thee. Tim. of Ath. 4: 3. 
And quicken his embraced heaviness. Mer. of Ven. 2: 8. 

SORT — class of people. 

Certain lewd fellows of the baser sort. Acts xvii. 5. 
Assemble all the poor men of your sort. Jul. Caes. 1 : 1. 

STRAIT— narrow, small. 

The place is too strait for us. II Kings vi. 1. 

Enter ye in at the strait gate for wide is the gate. Matt. vii. 13. 



BIBLE WORDS INTERPRETED 31 

STRAIT— Continued : 

All flying through a strait lane — 

That the strait pass was dammed with dead men. Cyt.ib. 5: 3. 

Honor travels in a strait so narrow. Troi. and Cres. 3: 3. 

TERROR — fear, power. 

Rulers are not a terror to good works. Rom. xiii. 3. 
Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord. 77 Cor. v. II. 
Lent him our terror. Meas. for Meas. 1:1. 

THOUGHT — anxious, anxiety. 

Take no thought for your life. Matt. vi. 25. Luke xii. 22. 

She pin'd in thought. Tzvelf. Night. 2: 4. 

Take thought and die. Jul. Caes. 2: 1. 

Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought. Ham. 3: 1. 

Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself. Ham. 4: 5. 

VERY — genuine, true. 

Whether thou be my very son Esau. Gen. xxvii. 21. 
This is the very Christ. John vii. 26. 
This gentleman, my very friend. Rom. and Jul. 3: 1. 
1 bid my very friends welcome. Mer. of Ven. 3: 2. 

WIT, WIST, WOT — know, perceive. 

To wit whether the Lord had made. Gen. xxiv. 21. 

He wist not what to say. Mark ix. 6. 

Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business. Luke ii. 49. 

I wot that through ignorance ye did it. Acts Hi. 17. 

We English warriors wot not what it means. / Hen. VI. 4: 7- 

I wist your grandam had a worser match. Rich. III. 1: 3. 

More water glideth by the mill 
Than wots the miller of. Titus And. 2: 1. 

WHAT — why. 

What need we any further witnesses. Mark xiv. 63. 
What need we any spur. Jul. Caes. 2: I. 



V 

SCRIPTURB'AND SHAKSPBARB PARALLBBSi 

Quotations, References, Paraphrases, etc. 

The following arrangement of passages serves to show the Poet's 
frequent use of thought and language as found in the sacred volume. 
It does not, of course, follow that these were all purposely quoted from 
the Bible, but it does establish, beyond all dispute, that the mind of the 
great dramatist was thoroughly imbued with the thoughts and teachings 
of the Scriptures. 1 

So frequently does he borrow figures of speech from the Bible, — 
adapting them to incidents or characters of his plays — that they, not 
only illustrate his subject, or convey his moral, but they also throw 
new light upon the Scripture text. 

Moreover, no one can read these Bible passages, placed as they are 
here, side by side, with others from the Poet, without perceiving some- 
thing of the great debt we owe to the scriptures for much that is best 
and greatest in Shakspeare. 

Some of these parallelisms are very striking; as, for example, the 
various uses which are made in the respective plays of such historic 
events as the murder of Abel by his brother ; Jeptha's vow of sacrifice ; 
Herod's slaughter of infants ; the betrayal by Judas ; and the parable of 
the prodigal son. 

Among the parallels are some Bible texts literally quoted, but the 
greater part of them are better than verbatim quotations. They are 
the Word inbreathed, until it became Shakspeare' s, and then, from this 
incarnated word, — genius inspired, there has been given to the world 
lessons high and broad : — a new interpretation ; the truth with a new 
application read and written, into the life and experience of men and 
women as they are found in and of the world. 

1 Referring to the allusion to Matt. 5 : 22 in the Merchant of Venice 1 : I, 
Sprague remarks : " Shakspeare is so familiar with the Bible that we who know 
less of the sacred book are sometimes slow to catch his allusions." See Sprague's 
Notes on The Mer. of Ven. 

32 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPBARB PARALLELS 



33 



Some of these passages are repeated and extended under the title of 
Scripture Themes in Shakspeare, but others of them are given only 
under this order of arrangement. 



PARALLEL PASSAGES 



Blessed are the peacemakers. 

Matt. v. 9. 

Not one of them (sparrows) is for- 
gotten before God. 

Luke xii 6. 
Matt. x. 29. 

Behold the fowls of the air and 

your heavenly Father feedeth them. 
Matt. vi. 26. 

Thy word is a lamp unto my feet 
and a light unto my path. 

Ps. cxix. 105. 

The Lord was my stay. 

Ps. xvii. 18. 
The Lord is my rock and my 
fortress. 

Ps. xviiii. 2. 
Ps. xxxi. 3. 

The Lord's anointed. 

I Sam. xxvi. 11, 16. 
Destroy this temple. John ii. 19. 
The temple of this body. 

John 11. 21. 

Forgive and ye shall be forgiven. 
Luke vi. 37. 
See also Matt. vi. 12, 14, 15. 



Sufficient unto the day is the evil 
thereof. Matt. vi. 34. 



God hath chosen the weak things of 
the world to confound the things which 
are mighty. 1 Cor. i. 27. 

See also Matt. xi. 25. 
Out of the mouth of babes and suck- 
lings hast thou ordained strength. 
Ps. vii. 2. 

Buy the truth and sell it not. 

Prov. xxiii. 23. 

Do good to them that hate you. 
Matt, v, 44. 
3 



Blessed are the peace-makersy on 
earth. II Hen. VI. 2:1. 

There's a special providence in the 
fall of a sparrow. 

Ham. 5 : 2. 



He that^ doth the ravens feed 
Yea, providently caters for the spar- 
row. As You Like It 2 : 3. 

God shall be my hope, 
My stay, my guide, and lantern to 
my feet. II Hen. VI. 2 : 3. 



God is our fortress. 



I Hen. VI. 2:1. 



Most sacrilegious murder hath broke 

ope 
The Lord's anointed temple and stole 

thence 
The life o' the building. Macb. 2 : 3." 

I as free forgive as I would be for- 
given. Hen. VIII. 2 : 1. 

I pardon him as God shall pardon 
me. Rich. II. 5 : 3. 

But it sufficeth that the day will end, 
And then the end is known. 

Jul. Caesar 5 : 1. 

He that of the greatest works is 

finisher 
Oft does them by the weakest minister 
So holy writ in babes hath judgment 

shown. All's Well. 2:1. 



Buy terms divine in selling hours of 
dross. Sonnet 146. 

Cherish those hearts that hate thee. 
Hen. VIII. 3 : 2. 



34 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



Overcome evil with good. 

Rom. xii. 21. 



Pray for them that despitefully use 
you. Matt. v. 44. 

Beareth all things, believeth all 
things, hopeth all things, endureth all 
things, love never faileth. 

• I Cor. xiii. 7, 8. 

Whom the Lord loveth he chasten- 
eth. Heb. xii. 6. 



Why beholdest thou the mote that 
is in thy brother's eye but considerest 
not the beam that is in thine own eye. 

Matt. vii. 3. 

Luke vi. 42. 



Let every man be swift to hear, slow 
to speak, slow to wrath. James 1. 19. 



If your soul were in my soul's stead, 
I would strengthen you with my mouth, 
and assuage your grief. Job xvi. 4-6. 

It is easier for a camel to go through 
the eye of a needle. Matt. xix. 24. 



If a house be divided against itself 
that house cannot stand. 

Mark iii. 25. 



Be baptized and wash away thy sins. 
Acts xxii. 16. 



For all have sinned. Rom. iii. 23. 



The tree is known by his fruit. 

Matt. xii. 33. 

Though your sins be as scarlet they 
shall be as white as snow. 

Isa i. 18. 



With a piece of scripture 
Tell them that God bids us do good 
for evil. Rich. III. 1 : 3. 

Pray for them that have done scath * 
to us. Rich. III. 1 : 3. 

Love is not love 
Which altereth when it alteration finds. 
Sonnet 116. 

This sorrow's heavenly 
It strikes where it doth love. 

Othello 5 : 2. 

You found his mote; the king your 

mote did see. 
But I a beam do find in each of three. 
Love's Labor 4 : 3. 
A moth it is to trouble the mind's 
eye. Ham. 1:1. 

That there were but a mote in your 
(eyes). King John 4:1. 

Give every man thine ear, but few thy 

voice. 
Take each man's censure but reserve 

thy judgment. Ham. 1 : 3. 

Had you such a loss as I 
I could give better comfort than you 
do. King John 3 : 4. 

It is as hard to come as for a camel 
To thread through the postern of a 
needle's eye. Rich. II. 5 : 5. 

O, if you rear this house against this 

house 
It will the woefullest division prove. 
Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Your conscience wash'd 
As pure as sin with baptism. 

Hen. V. 1:2. 

Forbear to judge, for we are sinners 
all. II Hen. VI. 3 : 3- 

If the tree be known by the fruit 
and fruit by the tree. I Hen. IV. 2 : 4. 

What if this curs'd hand 
Were thicker than itself with brother's 

blood? 
Is there not rain enough in the sweet 

heavens, . 
To wash it white as snow? 

Ham. 3:3. 



1 Injury or harm. 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPEARE PARALLELS 



35 



If . . . every transgression and dis- The means that Heaven yields must be 
obedience received a just recompense embrac'd 

of reward, how shall we escape if we And not neglected; else if heaven 
neglect so great salvation? Heb. ii. 2, 3. would 



Ye will not come unto Me. 

John v. 40. 

Whosoever will save his life shall 
lose it. Luke ix. 24. 

Matt. x. 39. 



And we will not, heaven's offer we 
refuse. Rich II. 3 : 2 . 

You have too much respect upon the 

world 
They lose it that do buy it with much 
care. Mer. of Ven. 1:1. 



By the works of the law shall no Though justice be thy plea, consider 



flesh be justified 



Gal. ii. 16. 



Godliness with contentment is great 
gain. I Tim. vi. 6. 

Neither do men light a candle, and 
put it under a bushel, but on a candle 



this : 
That in the course of justice none 

of us 
Should see salvation. 

Mer of Ven. 4:1. 

Poor and content is rich and rich 
enough. Othello 3 : 3. 

Heaven doth with us as we with 
torches do 



stick and it giveth light unto all that Not light them for themselves : for if 



are in the house. Let your light so 
shine before men. Matt. v. 15, 16. 



Love is the fulfilling of the law. 
Rom. xiii. 10. 



Thy right hand hath holden me up. 
Ps. xviii. 35. 

In thy presence is fullness of joy, 
at thy right hand are pleasures for 
evermore. Ps. xvi. 1 1. 

Refresh by bowels in the Lord. 

Philemon Verse 20. 

Are they not all ministering spirits? 
Heb. i. 14. 

Thou makest it soft with showers. 
Ps lxv. 10. 

As the cold of snow in the time 
of harvest. Prov. xxv. 13. 

The Lord that made heaven and 
earth bless thee. Ps. cxxxiv. 3. 



our virtues 
Did not go forth of us, t'were all 
alike as if we had them not. 

Meas. for Meas. 1:1. 

How far that little candle throws his 

beams 
So shines a good deed in a naughty 
world. Mer. of Ven. 5 : 1. 

Charity itself fulfills the law 
And who can sever love from charity? 
Love's Labor 4 : 3. 

In the great hand of God I stand. 
Macb. 2 : 3. 

The treasury of everlasting joy. 

II Hen. VI. 2:1. 



And bid you in the bowels of the 
Lord. Hen. V. 2:4. 

A ministering angel shall my sister 
be. Ham. 5 : 1. 

It droppeth as the gentle rain from 
heaven. Mer of Ven. 4: 1. 

As snow in harvest. 

Rich. III. 1:4. 

The Lord in heaven bless thee. 

Hen. V. 4:1. 



36 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



Ye ask and receive not, because ye 
ask amiss. James iv. 3. 



Though I be rude in speech. 

II Cor. xi. 6. 

Ye can discern the face of the sky. 
Matt. xvi. 3. 

Stand therefore, having your loins 
girt about with truth and having on 
the breastplate of righteousness. 

Eph. vi. 14. 

Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth 
her voice in the streets. 

Prov. i. 20. 

God is witness betwixt me and 
thee. Gen. xxxi. 50. 



What therefore God hath joined 
together let not man put asunder. 
Matt. xix. 6. 
Mark x. 9. 

Can the Ethiopian change his skin 
or the leopard his spots? 

Jer. xiii. 23. 

Woe to thee, O land, when thy king 
is a child. Eccl. x. 16. 

For that which I do I allow not, 
for what I would that do I not. 

Rom. vii. 15. 



Neither did their own arms save 
them; but Thy right hand and thine 
arm. Ps. xliv. 3. 

What is man that thou are mind- 
ful of him . . . thou hast made him 
a little lower than the angels. 

Ps. viii. 4. 

Heb. ii. 6. 

Whose names were not written in 
the book of life. Rev. xvii. 8. 

Let them be blotted out of the book 
of the living. Ps. Ixix. 28. 

To everything there is a season and 
a time to every purpose under heaven. 
Eccl. iii. 1. 



We ignorant of ourselves 
Beg often our own harms, which the 

wise powers 
Deny us for our good. 

Ant. and Cleo. 2:1. 

Rude am I in speech. 

Othello 1 : 3. 

Men judge by the complexion of 
the sky. Rich. II. 3 : 2. 

What stronger breastplate than a 
breast untainted. 

II Hen. VI. 3:2. 



Wisdom cries out in the streets and 
no man regards it. I Hen. IV. 1 : 2. 

God above 
Deal between thee and me. 

Macb., 4 : 3. 

God forbid that I should wish them 

sever'd 
Whom God hath joined together. 

Ill Hen. VI. 4: 1. 

Lions make leopards tame 
Yea ! but not change their spots. 

Rich. II. 1 : 1. 

Woe to the land that is govern'd 
by a child. Rich. III. 2 : 3. 

Alack, when once our grace we have 

forgot 
Nothing goes right; we would, and 

we would not. 

Meas. for Meas. 4 : 4. 

O God ! thy arm was here, 
And not to us but to thy arm alone 
Ascribe we all. Hen. V. 4:8. 

What a piece of work is man, how 

noble in reason, how infinite in faculty, 

in form and moving how express and 

admirable, in action how like an angel. 

Ham. 2 : 2. 

My name be blotted from the book 
of life. Rich. II. 1 : 3. 



There is a time for all things. 

Com. Err. 2 : 2. 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPBARE PARALLELS 



37 



A cedar in Lebanon with fair 
branches . . . and of high stature 
. . . All the fowls of heaven made 
their nests in his boughs and under his 
branches did all the beasts of the field 
bring forth their young. 

Ezek. xxxi. 3, 6. 



I indeed baptize you. 



Matt. iii. II. 



Without a parable spake he not unto 
them. Matt. xiii. 34. 



There was a certain rich man which 
was clothed in purple. . . . 

And there was a certain beggar 
named Lazarus . . . moreover the 
dogs came and licked his sores . . . 

The beggar died, and was carried 
by the angels into Abraham's bosom. 
Luke xvi. 22. 

Not this man but Barrabas. Now 
Barrabas was a robber. 

John xviii. 40. 



He casteth 
Beelzebub. 



out 



devils through 
Luke xi. 15. 



Legions of Angels. 

Matt. xxvi. 53. 

Then Herod . . . sent forth and 
slew all the children that were in 
Bethlehem. . . . 

In Rama was there a voice heard, 
lamentations and weeping and great 
mourning, Rachel weeping for her chil- 
dren and would not be comforted. 
Matt. ii. 16, 18. 

He (Herod) said, Go and search 
diligently for the young child and 
when ye have found him, bring me 
word again that I may come and wor- 
ship him. Matt. ii. 8. 

And the younger (son) said to his 
father, — Father, give me the portion 
of goods that falleth to me. . . . 

And (he) took his journey into a 
far country, and there wasted his sub- 
stance with riotous living. 

And when he had spent all. . . He 
began to be in want. 



Thus yield the cedar to the axe's edge 
Whose arms gave shelter to the 

princely eagle ; 
Under whose shade the ramping lion 

slept ; 
Whose top branch over-peer'd love's 
spreading tree. 

Ill Hen. VI. 5:2. 

I'll be new baptized. 

Rom. and Jul. 2 : 2. 

Thou shalt never get such a secret 

from me. 
But by a parable. 

Two Gent. 2:5. 

Dives that lived in purple. 

I Hen. IV. 3:3- 
As ragged as Lazarus in the painted 
cloth, where the glutton's dogs licked 
his sores. I Hen. IV. 4 : 2. 

Sweet peace, conduct his soul to 
the bosom of good old Abraham. 

Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Would, any of the stock of Barrabas 
Had been her husband rather than a 
Christian. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

Who's there i' the name of Belze- 
bub. Macb. 2 : 3. 

He holds Belzebub at the staves 
end. Twelfth Night 5:1. 

Legions of angels. 

Merry Wives 1 : 3. 

Whiles the mad mothers with their 
howls confused, 

Do break the clouds, as did the wives 
of Jewry 

At Herod's bloody-hunting slaughter- 
men. Hen. V. 3:3. 



Let me have a child to whom 
Herod of Jewry may do homage. 

Ant. and Cleo. 1 : 2. 



The story of the prodigal. 

II Hen. IV. 2:1. 
I have received my proportion like 
the prodigious son. Two Gent. 2 : 3. 

Shall I keep your hogs and eat 
husks with them? What prodigal por- 
tion have I spent that I should stand 
to such penury? 

As You Like It 1 : 1 



38 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



And he went and joined himself to 
a citizen of that country; and he sent 
him into his fields to feed swine. 

And he would fain have filled his 
belly with the husks that the swine 
did eat. Luke xv. 12 — 16. 

His parents answered them and said, 
We know that this is our son, and 
that he was born blind. 

John ix. 20. 



Who did sin, this man, or his 
parents, that he was born blind? 

If ye were blind ye should have 
no sin ; but now ye say, we see ; there- 
fore your sin remaineth. 

John ix. 2, 41. 



And Nathaniel said, Can any good 
thing come out of Nazareth? 

John i. 46. 
Then went the devils out of the man 
and entered the swine. 

Luke viii. 33. 

He sat down with the twelve. And 
as they did eat, he said, Verily I say 
unto you, that one of you shall betray 
me. . . 



He that dippeth his hand with me in 
the dish, the same shall betray me. 



And forthwith he (Judas) came to 
Jesus and said Hail, Master! and 
kissed him. 

Matt. xxvi. 20, 21, 23, 49. 



Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot. 
John xiv. 22. 



'Tis painted about with the story of 
the prodigal. Merry Wives 4 : 5. 

You would think that I had a hun- 
dred and fifty tattered prodigals lately 
come from swine keeping from eating 
draft and husks. I Hen. IV. 4 : 2. 

What ! hast thou been long blind 
and now restored? 

Born blind ! 

Ay ! indeed was he ! 

What woman is this? 

His wife! 

Had'st been his mother thou 
could'st have better told. 
A blind man at St. Alban's shrine 
Within this half-hour received his 

sight 
A man that ne'er saw in this life. 

Great is his comfort in this earthly 
vale 

Although by his sight his sins be 
multiplied.' II Hen. VI. 2:1. 

Bass. If it please you to dine with 
us! 

Shy. Yes, to smell pork, to eat of 
the habitation which your prophet, the. 
Nazarite, conjured the devil into. 

Mer. of Ven. 1 : 3. 

Did they not sometimes cry, All hail ! 

to me? 
So Judas did to Christ, but he 

in twelve 
Found truth in all but one. 

Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Who can call him his friend that 
dips in the same dish? 

Tim. of Athens. 3 : 2. 

So Judas kiss'd his master, and cried 
All hail ! when as he meant, all harm ! 
Ill Hen. VI. 5 : 7- 
His kisses are Judas's own children. 

As You Like It. 3 : 4. 
Three Judases, each one thrice 
worse than Judas. Rich. II. 3 : 2. 

A kissing traitor : How art thou 
prov'd Judas? Love's Labor 5:2. 

My name 
Be yok'd with his that did betray the 
Best. Winter's Tale. 1 : 2. 

Hoi. " Judas I am. 

Dum. A Judas ! 

Hoi. Mot Iscariot, sir, — 






v" 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPBARB PARALLELS 



39 



Pilate . . . took water and washed 
his hands before the multitude, saying, 
I am innocent of the blood of this just 
person. Matt, xxvii. 24. 



The place called Golgotha. 

Matt, xxvii. 33. 
The place of a skull. Mark xv. 22. 
The place of a skull, which is called 
in the Hebrew Golgotha. 

John xix. 17. 

And the graves were opened and 
many bodies of the saints which slept 
arose and came out of their graves. 
Matt, xxvii. 52. 

Men loved darkness rather than 
light because their deeds were evil. 
John iii. 19. 



The last enemy that shall be de- 
stroyed is death. I Cor. xv. 26. 

Thou hast brought me into the dust 
of death! Ps. xxii. 15. 

To give light to them that sit in 
darkness and in the shadow of death. 
Luke i. 79. 



Biron. A kissing traitor: How art 
thou prov'd Judas? 

Hoi. "Judas I am." — 

Dum. The more shame for you 
Judas. 

Hoi. What mean you, sir? 

Boyet. To make Judas hang him- 
self. 

Hoi. Begin, sir; you are my elder. 

Biron. Well follow'd : Judas was 
hang'd on an elder. 1 

Love's Labor 5 : 2. 

With Pilate wash your hands 
Showing an outward pity : yet you 

Pilate's 
Have here deliver'd me to my sour 

cross 
And water cannot wash away your 

sins. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

How fain, like Pilate, would I wash 

my hands 
Of this most grievous murther! 

Rich. III. 1:4. 

Memorize another Golgotha. 

Macb. 1 : 2. 

And this land be call'd 
The field of Golgotha, and dead men's 
skulls. Rich. II. 4: I. 

And the grave stood tenantless, and 
the sheeted dead did squeal and 
gibber in the Roman streets. 

Ham. 1 : 1. 

Those men 
Blush not in actions black as night 
Will shun no course to keep them from 
the light. Pericles 1 : 1. 

When the searching eye of heaven is 

hid 
Behind the globe, and lights the lower 

world, 
Then thieves and robbers range abroad 
unseen. Rich. II. 3 : 2. 

Death once dead, there's no more 
dying then. Sonnet 146. 

— The way to dusty death. 

Macb. 5:5. 

Darkness and the gloomy shade of 
death environ you. 

I Hen. VI. 5 : 4- 



J The common tradition was that Judas hang'd himself to an elder tree. Knight. 



40 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



Thou shalt surely die 



Gen. ii. 17. 



Dead in his harness. 

II Mace. xv. 28. 

Then shall ye bring down my gray 
hairs with sorrow to the grave. 

Gen. xlii. 38. 



Here we feel but the penalty of 
Adam. As You Like It 2:1. 

We will die with harness on our 
back. Macb. 5 : 5. 

Mine eyes are full of tears, my heart 

of grief; 
Ah, Humphrey this dishonor in thine 

age 
Will bring thy heart with sorrow to 

the ground. II Hen. VI. 2 : 3. 



I go whence I shall not return, even The undiscover'd country from whose 
to the land of darkness and the shadow bourne 

of death. Job x. 21. No traveller returns. Ham. 3 : 1. 



We spend our years as a tale that is 
told. Ps. xc. 9. 

Man is like to vanity : his days are 
a shadow that passeth away. 

Ps. cxliv. 4. 

Which long for death but it cometh 
not . . . which rejoice exceedingly and 
are glad when they can find the grave. 
Job iii. 21, 22. 



My days are swifter than a weaver's 
shuttle. Job vii. 6. 

To die is gain. Phil. i. 21. 

I die daily. I Cor. xv. 31. 



No chastening for the present 
seemeth to be joyous, but grevious, 
nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the 
peaceable fruits of righteousness. 

Heb. xii. 11. 

Not by might, nor by power, but by 
my spirit. Zech. iv. 6. 

The prince of this world cometh. 
John xiv. 30. 

Strait is the gate and narrow is the 
wa} r which leadeth unto life. 

Matt. vii. 14. 
Luke xiii. 24. 

Put not your trust in princes. 

Ps. cxlvi. 3. 



Life's but a walking shadow 

... it is a tale 
Told by an idiot, full of sound 
Signifying nothing. Macb. 5 : 5. 



My joy is death! 
Death at whose name I oft have been 

afear'd 
Because I wish'd this world's eternity. 
II Hen. VI. 2 : 4. 

Life is a shuttle. 

Merry Wives 5:1. 

Dying so, death is to him advant- 
age. Hen. V. 4:1. 

The queen .... 
Died every day she lived. 

Macb. 4 : 3. 

Sweet are the uses of adversity. 
As You Like It 2:1. 



Not by might master'd, but by 
special grace. Love's Labor 1:1. 

He is the prince of this world. 

All's Well 4:5- 

I am for the house with the narrow 
gate. All's Well 4 : 5. 



O, how wretched 
Is that poor man that hangs on prince's 
favors. Hen. VIII. 3 : 2. 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPBARB PARALLELS 



4i 



Blessed is the man that walketh not 
in the counsel of the ungodly. 

Ps. i. 1. 

A good name is rather to be chosen 
than great riches. Prov. xxii. 1. 

A good name is better than precious 
ointment. Eccl. vii. 1. 



For which of you intending to build 
a tower, sitteth not down first and 
counteth the cost, whether he have 
sufficient to finish it? 

Luke xiv. 28. 



Out of the abundance of the heart 
the mouth speaketh./ A good man out 
of the good treasure of the heart 
bringeth forth good things and an evil 
man out of the evil treasure bringeth 
forth evil things. 

Matt. xii. 34, 35- 

Those things which proceed out of 
the mouth come forth from the heart, 
and they defile the man. For out of 
the heart proceed evil thoughts. 

Matt. xv. 18, 19. 

Mark vii. 21. 

The tongue is a fire, a world of 
iniquity. James III. 6. 

Their tongue is deceitful. 

Micah vi. 12. 

He that rolleth a stone it will re- 
turn upon him. Prov. xxvi. 27. 



Remember not the sins of my youth. 
Ps. xxv. 7. 

Let me be weighed in an even 
balance. Job xxxi. 6. 

Prosperity and adversity .... 
God hath set the one over against the 
other. Eccl. 7. 14. 



'Tis meet — 
That noble minds keep ever with their 
likes. Jul. Caes. 1 : 2. 

Good name, in man and woman, dear 

my lord 
Is the immediate jewel of their souls. 
Who steals my purse, steals trash. 
But he that filches from me my good 

name 
Robs me of that which not enriches 

him, 
And makes me poor indeed. 

Othello 3 : 3. 

When we mean to build 
Then must we rate the cost of erec- 
tion 
Which, if we find outweighs ability, 
What do we then, but draw anew the 

model 
In fewer offices; or desist 
To build at all. 

II Hen. IV. 1 : 3- 

What his heart thinks his tongue 
speaks. Much Ado 3 : 2. 



All offenses, my lord, come from the 
heart. Hen. V. 4:8. 



The tongues of men are full of 
deceits. Hen. V. 5 .2. 



When we first put this dangerous stone 

a rolling 
T'would fall upon ourselves. 

Hen. VIII. 5 :2. 

If the sins of your youth are for- 
given you. Winters Tale 3 : 3. 

Justice always whirls in equal 
measure. Love's Labor 4 13. 

The web of our life is of a mingled 
yarn, good and evil together. 

All's Well 4:3. 



42 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



Thorns and snares are in the way of 
the froward. Prov. xxii. 5. 



The way of a fool is right in his 
own eyes : but he that hearkeneth unto 
counsel is wise. Prov. xii. 15. 

If any man seemeth to be wise in 
this world let him become a fool that 
he may be wise. I Cor. iii. 18. 

Be sure your sins will find you out. 
Num. xxxii. 23. 



Visiting the iniquity of the fathers 
upon the children unto the third and 
fourth generation. Ex. xx. 5. 



He that loveth silver shall not be 
satisfied with silver ; nor he that loveth 
abundance with increase. Eccl. v. 10. 



What fellowship hath the wolf with 
the lamb. Ecclus xiii. 17. 



Canst thou draw out Leviathan with 
a hook? Job xli. 1. 



There shall not a hair fall from the 
head of any of you. Acts xxvii. 34. 



The heavens declare the glory of 
God and the firmament showeth his 
handy work. . . . There is no speech 
nor language where their voice is not 
heard. Ps. xix. 1, 3. 

When the morning stars sang to- 
gether. Job xxxviii. 7. 



I am amazed methinks, and lose my 

way 
Among the thorns and dangers of this 

world. King John 4 : 3. 

The fool doth think he is wise, but 
the wise man knows he is a fool. 

As You Like It 5 : 1. 



For murder though it have no tongue 

will speak 
With most miraculous organ. 

Ham. 2 : 2. 

The sins of the father are to be laid 
upon the children. 

Mer. of Ven. 3 : 5. 
Thy sins are visited in this child 
The canon of the law is laid on him 
Being but the second generation 
Removed from thy sin conceiving 
womb. King John 2: 1. 

The aged man that coffers up his gold 
Is plagued with cramps and gouts and 

painful fits 
And scarce hath eyes his treasure to 

behold. Lucrece, St. 123. 

Nature teaches beasts to know their 

friends 
Pray you who does the wolf love? 
The Lamb. 
Ah ! to devour him. Corio. 2 : 1. 

We may as bootless spend our vain 
command as send precepts to the 
Leviathan 

To come ashore. Hen. V. 3:3. 

There is no soul 
No, not so much perdition as a hair 
Betid to any creature in this vessel 
Which thou heard'st cry. 

The Tempest 1 : 2. 

Look how the floor of heaven 

Is thick inlaid with patines of bright 

gold: 
There's not the smallest orb which 

thou behold'st 
But in his motion like an angel sings. 1 
Mer. of Ven. 5:1. 



1 Hallam speaks of this passage as " The most sublime," perhaps, in Shak- 
speare. 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPEARE PARALLELS 



43 



Who fed thee in the wilderness 
with manna. Deut. vii. 16. 

Num. xi. 9. 

For with my staff I (Jacob) passed 
over this Jordan. Gen. xxii. 10. 

The full soul loatheth an honey- 
comb. Prov. xxvii. 7. 



Hast thou found honey? Eat so 
much as is sufficient for thee lest thou 
be filled therewith and vomit it. 

Prov. xxv. 16. 



Unstable as water. Gen. xlix. 4. 

Fear not, neither be thou dismayed. 
Josh. viii. 1. 

Every man is tempted when he is 
drawn away of his own lust, and en- 
ticed. Then when lust hath conceived 
it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it 
is finished bringeth forth death. 

James i. 14, 15. 



To be tempted of the devil. 

Matt. iv. 1. 

The father shall be divided against 
the son and the son against the father. 
Luke xii. 53. 



O generation of vipers. 

Matt. iii. 7. 

Their poison is like the poison of a 
serpent, they are like the deaf adder. 
Ps. lviii. 44. 



They have sharpened their tongues 
like a serpent; adder's poison is under 
their lips. Ps. cxl. 3. 



Fair ladies, you drop manna in the 
way of starved people. 

Mer. of Ven. 5:1. 

By Jacob's staff I swear. 

Mer. of Ven. 2 : 5. 

They surfeited with honey and began 
To loathe the taste of sweetness. 

I Hen. IV. 3 : 2. 

The sweetest honey 
Is loathsome in deliciousness, 
And in the taste confounds the 

appetite, 
Therefore love moderately. 

Rom. and Jul. 2 : 6. 

False as water. Othello 5 : 2. 

Cheer thy heart, and be thou not 
dismay'd. Rich. III. 5 : 3. 

The expense of spirit in a waste of 

shame 
Is lust in action; and till action, lust 
Is perjur'd, murderous, bloody, full of 

blame, 
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to 

trust; . . . 
All this the world well knows; yet 

none know well 
To shun the heaven that leads men 

to this hell. Sonnet 129. 

Shall I be tempted of the devil 
thus? Rich. III. 4:4. 

And the bond 

Cracked between son and father: 
This villian of mine comes under the 
prediction; There's son against 
father. King Lear 1 : 2. 

A generation of vipers. 

Troi. and Cress. 3:1. 

Have ears more deaf than adders. 
Troi and Cress. 2 : 2. 
Art thou like the adder, waxen deaf 
Be poisonous too. 

II Hen. VI. 3 : 2. 

An adder did it 
For with doubler tongue than thine, 
Thou serpent — never adder stung. 

Mid. N. Dr. 3 : 2. 



44 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



The dog is turned to his own vomit 
again. II Peter ii. 22. 



Let the day perish in which I was 
born, and the night in which _ it was 
said, there is a man child conceived. 
Job iii. 3- 

Seven other kine, poor and very- 
ill-favored and lean fleshed. 

Gen. xli. 19. 

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to 
live. Ex. xxii. 18. 



For satan himself is transformed 
into an angel of light. 

II Cor. xi. 14. 



How art thou fallen from heaven 
O, Lucifer ... yet thou shalt be 
brought down to hell. 

Isa. xiv. 12, 15. 



What is thy name? And he said, 
Legion, because many devils were 
entered in him. Luke viii. 30. 

Mark v. 9. 

Then the devil said ... It is 
written, He shall give his angels 
charge concerning thee. 

Matt. iv. 5, 6. 

And Satan said, skin for skin. Yea 
all that a man hath will he give for 
his life. But put forth thine hand now 
and touch his bone and his flesh and 
he will curse thee to thy face. 

Then said his wife unto him, dost 
thou still retain thine integrity? Curse 
God and die. But he said, What ! shall 
we receive good at the hand of God 
and not evil; in all this did not Job 
sin with his lips. Job ii. 4, 10. 



So, so, thou common dog did'st thou 

disgorge 
Thy glutton bosom . . . 
And now thou would'st eat thy dead 

vomit up. II Hen. IV. 1 : 3. 

Turn this day out of the week; 
. . . Let wives with child 
Pray that their burdens may not fall 
this day. King John 3:1. 

If to be fat be to be hated then 
Pharaoh's lean kine are to be loved. 

I Hen. IV. 2:4. 

Receive the sentence of the law for 

sins 
Such as by God's book are adjudged 

to death . . . 
The witch shall be burned to ashes. 

II Hen. VI. 2:3. 

The devil hath power 
To assume a pleasing shape. 

Ham. 2 : 2. 
When devils will their blackest sins 

put on 
They do suggest at first with heavenly 
shows. Othello 2 : 3. 

Thou art more deep damned than 

Prince Lucifer. 
There is not yet so ugly a fiend of 
hell. King John 4 : 3. 

H£ falls like Lucifer never to hope 
again. Hen. VIII. 3 : 2. 

Though he be as goot a gentleman 
as the tevil is, as Lucifer and Belzebub 
himself. Hen. V. 4:7. 

If all the devils in hell be drawn 
in little, and Legion himself possessed 
him. Twelfth Night 3:4. 



The devil can cite scripture for his 
purpose. Mer. of Ven. 1 : 3. 



I am as poor as Job, but not as 
patient. II Hen. IV. 1 : 2. 

Ford. Slanderous as Satan? 

Page. And poor as Job? 
Ford. And as wicked as his wife? 
Merry Wives 5 : 5. 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPEARE PARALLELS 



45 



The prince of this world cometh. 
John xiv. 30. 

For it was not an enemy that re- 
proached me : then I could have borne 
it : neither was it he that hated me 
that did magnify himself against me. 

But it was thou, a man mine equal, 
my guide, and mine acquaintance. 

We took sweet counsel together, 
and walked into the house of God in 
company. Ps. lv. 12, 14. 



Whosoever shall say 'thou fool' 
shall be in danger of hell fire. 

Matt. v. 22. 



The righteous shall flourish like a 
palm tree. Ps. xcii. 12. 

I will have mercy on whom I will 
have mercy and I will have compassion 
on whom I will have compassion. 
Rom. ix. 15. 

Thou shalt not kill. Ex. xx. 13. 
Thou shalt do no murder. 

Matt. xix. 18. 



Thou shalt not steal. 



Ex. xx. 15. 



Woe unto them that call evil good 
and good evil ; that put darkness for 
light and light for darkness. 

Isa. v. 20. 

His mischief shall return upon his 
own head. Ps. vii. 16. 



His blood be on us and our chil- 
dren. Matt, xxvii. 25. 

He that toucheth pitch shall be de- 
filed therewith, and he that hath fel- 
lowship with a proud man shall be 
like him. Ecclus xiii. 1. 



He is the prince of the world. 
All's Well 4:5. 

The private wound is deepest : O time, 

most accurs'd, 
Mongst all foes, that a friend should 

be the worst. 

Two Gent, of Ver. 5 : 4. 

Thou that did'st bear the key of all my 

counsels, 
That knew'st the very bottom of my 

soul, 
That almost might have coin'd me into 

gold . . . 
May it be possible, that foreign hire 
Could out of thee extract one spark 

of evil 
That might annoy my finger? 

Hen. V. 2:2. 

If they should speak, would almost 

damn those ears 
Which, hearing them, would call their 

brothers fools. 

Mer. of Ven. 1:1. 

You shall see him a palm in Athens 
again. Tim. of Athens 5:1. 

The words of Heaven, — on whom it 

will, it will ; 
On whom it will not so; yet still 'tis 

just. Meas. for Meas. 1:3. 

The great King of Kings hath in the 

table of his law commanded 
That thou shalt do no murder. 

Rich. III. 1:4. 

Thou shalt not steal. 

Meas. for Meas. 1 : 2. 

Oftentimes, to win us to our harm, 
The instruments of darkness tell us 
truths. Macb. 1 : 3. 

O God, what mischief work the wicked 

ones 
Heaping confusion on their own head 

thereby. II Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

My deeds upon my head. 

Mer. of Ven. 4:1. 

They that touch pitch will be de- 
filed. Much Ado 3 : 3. 
As like to pitch defile nobility. 

II Hen. VI. 2:1. 
This pitch doth defile, so doth the 
company thou keepest. 

I Hen. IV. 2:4- 



4 6 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



As he that lieth down in the midst 
of the sea, or as he that lieth down 
upon the top of a mast. 

Prov. xxiii. 34. 

Strong bulls of Bashan have beset 
me round. They gaped upon me with 
their mouths as a ravening and roar- 
ing lion. Ps. xxii. 12, 13. 

If a man dies and have no son, then 
ye shall cause his inheritance to pass 
upon his daughter. Num. xxvii. 8. 



The ten commandments. 

Ex. xxxiv. 28. 

And the Lord God took the man 
and put him into the garden of Eden 
to dress it. Gen. ii. 15. 

The woman said, the serpent be- 
guiled me and I did eat. Gen. iii. 13. 



And the Lord God sent him 
(Adam) forth from the garden to till 
the ground. Gen. iii. 23. 



And Eve bare Cain and said, I have 
gotten a man from the Lord. 

Gen. iv. 1. 



Cain rose up against Abel his 
brother and slew him. Gen. iv. 8. 



The voice of thy brother's blood 
crieth unto me from the ground. 

Gen. iv. 10. 



And now art thou cursed from the 
earth. Gen. iv. II. 



A fugitive and a vagabond shalt 
thou be in the earth. Gen. iv. 12. 

And they went unto Noah into the 
ark two and two of all flesh . . . And 
the flood was forty days upon the 
earth. Gen. vii. 15, 17. 



Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast 
Ready with every nod to tumble down 
Into the fatal bowels of the deep. 
Rich III 3:4. 

that I were 
Upon the hill of Basan, to out-roar 
The horned herd. 

Ant. and Cleo. 3 : 2. 

In the book of Numbers is it writ, 
When the man dies, let the inheritance 
Descend unto the daughter. 

Hen. V. 1:2. 

I'd set my ten commandments in 
your face. II Hen. VI. 1 : 3. 

Thou old Adam's likeness set to 
dress this garden. . . . 
What Eve, what serpent hath sug- 
gested thee. 
To make a second fall of cursed man. 
Rich II. 3:4. 

In the state of innocency Adam fell. 

1 Hen. IV. 3 : 3. 
The scripture says, Adam digged. 

Ham. 5 : 1. 

The birth of Cain, the first male 
child. King John 3 : 4. 

The first born Cain. 

II Hen. IV. 1 : 1. 

How the knave jowls it to the ground, 
As if it were Cain's jawbone that did 
the first murder. Ham. 5:1. 

O my offence is rank, it smells to 

heaven 
It hath the primal eldest curse upon't 
A brother's murder. Ham. 3 : 3. 

Which blood like sacrificing Abel's 

cries 
Even from the tongueless cavern of 

the earth. Rich. II 1:1. 

Thy brother's blood the thirsty 
earth hath drunk. Ill Hen. VI. 2 : 3. 

Be thou cursed Cain 
To slay thy brother Abel. 

I Hen. VI. 1 : 3. 

With Cain, go wander through the 
shade of night. Rich. II 5:6. 

There is sure another flood toward 
And these couples are coming to the 
ark. As You Like It 5:4. 

Noah's flood could not do it. 

Com. of Err. 3 : 2. 



SCRIPTURE AND SHAKSPEARB PARALLELS 



47 



None of you shall approach to any 
that is near of kin. Lev. xviii. 6. 



Antl the house of Jacob shall be a 
fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, 
and the house of Esau for stubble 
and they shall kindle in them and 
there shall not be any remaining house 
of Esau. Obadiah. Verse 18. 

He that ruleth over men must be 
just. II Sam. xxiii. 3. 



Whosoever hateth his brother is a 
murderer. I John iii. 15. 

And Jacob said thou shalt not give 
me anything: if thou wilt do this thing 
for me I will again feed and keep thy 
flock. 

I will pass through all thy flock 
to-day, removing from thence all 
speckled and spotted cattle, and all the 
brown cattle among the sheep, and the 
spotted and speckled among the goats : 
and of such shall be my hire. 1 

Gen. xxx. 31. 



Then Jael . . . took a hammer in 
her hand . . . and smote the nail into 
his temples, and fastened it to the 
ground, for he was fast asleep. 

Judges iv. 21. 

And he (Samson) smote them hip 
and thigh with a great slaughter. 

Judges xv. 8. 



Adam's sons are my brethren, and 

truly 
I hold it a sin to match in my kindred. 
Much Ado. 2:1. 

— will be his fire 
To kindle their dry stubble, and their 

blaze 
Shall darken him forever. 

Corio. 2 : 1. 



He who the sword of Heaven will 

bear, 
Should be as holy as severe. 

Meas. for Meas. 3 : 2. 

Hates any man the thing he would 
not kill. Mer. of Ven. 4:1. 

Shy. When Jacob graz'd his uncle 
Laban's sheep, 

This Jacob from our holy Abraham 
was. 

Ant. And what of him? did he take 
interest? 

Shy. No, not take interest, not as 
you would say — 
Directly interest. Mark what Jacob 

did: 
When Laban and himself were com- 
promised 
That all the Eanlings 2 which were 

streak'd and pied 
Should fall as Jacob's hire. . . . 
Ant. This was a venture, sir, that 

Jacob serv'd for 
A thing not in his power to bring to 

pass, 
But sway'd and fashioned by the hand 

of Heaven. 
Was this inserted to make interest 

good ? 3 
Or is your gold and silver ewes and 

rams ? Mer. of Ven. 1 : 3. 

I'll yield him thee asleep 
Where thou may'st knock a nail into 
his head. Tempest 3 : 2. 



I am not Samson 

To mow them down before me. 

Hen. VIII. 5 : 3. 



1 Compare Gen. xxx. 27-43 with the description of Jacob-Laban contract in the 
Mer. of Ven. 

2 Eanling — a lamb new-born. 

3 This shows that Shakspeare used the version known as Bishop's Bible (1568). 
Sprague's Notes. 



48 



BIBLICAL TRANSLATIONS 



And Samson took the doors of the 
gate of the city . . .put them upon 
his shoulders and carried them to the 
top of the hill. Judges xvi. 3. 

And Jephthah vowed a vow unto the 
Lord. Judges xi. 30. 

And Jephthah judged Israel six 
years. Judges xii. 7. 



Goliath of Gath . . . and the staff 
of his spear was like a weaver's beam. 
I Sam. xvii. 7. 

Therefore David ran and stood upon 
the Philistine and took his sword and 
slew him, and cut off his head. 

I Sam. xvii. 51. 

When the Queen of Sheba heard of 
the fame of Solomon concerning the 
name of the Lord she came to prove 
him with hard questions. 

I Kings x. I. 



Because the King's command was 
urgent and the fire exceeding hot the 
flame of the fire slew those men that 
took up Shadrach, Meshach and 
Abednego. Dan. iii. 22. 

And Daniel convicted them of false 
witness. And from that day forth was 
Daniel had in great reputation. 

Susanna Vs. 61, 64. 



Samson Master : . . he carried the 
town gates on his back, like a porter. 
Love's Labor 1 : 2. 



To keep that oath were more impiety 
Than Jephthah's when he sacrificed his 
daughter. Ill Hen. VI. 5:1. 

Ham. O Jephthah judge of Israel, 
what a treasure hast thou ! 

Pol. What a treasure had he my 
lord? . . . 

Ham. Am I not i' the right old 
Jephthah ? 

Pol. If you call me Jephthah my 
lord, 

I have a daughter that I love pass- 
ing well. 1 Ham. 2 : 2. 

Goliath with a weaver's beam. 

Merry Wives. 5:1. 



With his own sword 
Which he did wave against my throat 

. . . I have taken 
His head from him. Cymb. 4 : 2. 

Sheba was never 
More covetous of wisdom and fair 

virtue 
Than this pure soul shall be. 

Hen. VIII 5:4- 

Sec the whole of Cranmer's blessing 
upon the Royal infant in Hen. 
VIII. 

Heat not a furnace so hot 
That it do singe thyself. 

Hen. VIII. 1 : 1. 



A Daniel come to judgment! yea a 

Daniel 
O wise young Judge, how I do honor 

thee. Mer. of Ven. 4:1. 



If any of you know cause, or just 
impediment, why these two persons 
should not be joined together in holy 
matrimony, ye are to declare it. 

Episcopal Prayer Book. 



If either of you know any inward 
impediment, why you should not be 
conjoined, I charge you, on your souls, 
to utter it. Much Ado. 4:1. 



1 The story of Jephthah's daughter so copiously quoted in this play is given in 
Judges xi. 30-40. 



BOOK THIRD 

The Religious World of Shakspeare 



/. VERSATILITY OF SHAKSPBARB IN THE USE OF 
THE BIBLE 

II. TYPES OF CHARACTER FROM SCRIPTURE 

III. HEROES AND HEROINES 

IV. THE MORAL INCULCATIONS OF SHAKSPEARE 
V. TRAGEDY IN THE BIBLE AND IN SHAKSPEARE 

VI. RELIGIOUS THOUGHT IN THE PLOTS OF THE 

PLAYS 

VII. SHAKSPEARE AND IMMORTALITY 



49 



I 

VERSATILITY OF SHAKSPBARB IN TUB USB OF TUB 

BIBLB 

The "universality of Shakspeare" is in nothing more strikingly mani- 
fested than in the use he makes of his wide and general knowledge of 
the Scriptures. This fact is very copiously illustrated in a portion of 
this work, entitled "Scripture Themes." 

But there are some examples of his versatility of genius which are 
of peculiar interest from the standpoint of this volume. With great 
facility the dramatist employs the same Scripture facts, in different 
plays, representing a wide range of human motives, passions and con- 
duct. 

Thus, he frequently makes the hand of Cain and the blood of Abel 
to tell, in various ways, the respective stories which are forever asso- 
ciated with them. The parable of the Prodigal Son serves for various 
uses in five plays, and Judas is named, or referred to, in seven different 
plays to express the odium which is embodied in his very name, as well 
as the infamy of betrayal of which it is a synonym. ( See Parallel Pas- 
sages and Scripture Themes.) 

What a stroke of genius is exhibited in the use of Scripture, in King 
Henry V ! A dispute arises between England and France which Henry 
makes a casus belli. In a conference with the Archbishop of Canter- 
bury the question in dispute is thus expounded : — 

"There is no bar 
To make against your highness' claim to France, 
But this, which they produce from Pharamond, — 
' No woman shall succeed in Salique land.' " 

Canterbury goes on to declare that Salique land is really in Germany 
and not in France at all, and makes an elaborate argument to prove that 
the disputed territory which had come down through a female line was 
not subject to the law of King Pharamond. King Henry, anxious to 
justify himself, in his intended war, and at the same time secure the 
good will of the church, asks : "May I with right and conscience make 
this claim?" And Canterbury answers: — 

5i 



52 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

" The sin upon my head dread sovereign ; 
For in the book of Numbers is it writ, 
When the man dies, let the inheritance 
Descend unto the daughter." 

Hen. V. i: 2. 

Again, in the play of Hamlet how skillfully employed is the story of 
Jephthah and his daughter in a conversation with Polonius. And the 
same Bible incident serves to illustrate the effects of a sinful oath in 
this passage : — 

" To keep that oath, were more impiety 
Than Jephthah's, when he sacrificed his daughter." 

/// Hen. VI. 5: 1. 

A striking picture is drawn in Richard II. The King, while impris- 
oned in a dungeon at Pomfret Castle, indulges in a soliloquy upon a very 
singular thought : — 

" Studying how to compare 
This prison, where I live, unto the world : 
And, for because the world is populous, 
And here is not a creature but myself, 
I cannot do it; — Yet, I'll hammer it out. 
My brain I'll prove the female to my soul ; 
My soul the father : and these two beget 
A generation of still breeding thoughts, 
For no thought is contented." 

Strange as this fancy is, it is attended with devout and Scriptural 
reference : — 

" The better sort- 
As thoughts of things divine — are intermixed 
With scruples, and do set the word itself 
Against the word: 1 

As thus, — Come little ones; and then again, — 
It is as hard to come, as for a camel 
To thread the postern of a needle's eye." 

Rich. II. 5: 5. 

1 Some versions give "faith" here instead of "word." 



VERSATILITY IN USE OF BIBLE 53 

The Scripture parallel of this is given elsewhere in this work, but it 
is worthy of notice here, that the dramatist saw the true meaning of the 
"eye of a needle" in Matt. xix. 24 ; hence the use of the word "postern" 
conveying the thought of a small door or gate. 

While Shakspeare, in his environment, was unable to do justice to 
the genius and character of Joan d'Arc, yet how greatly his portraiture 
of that marvelous French maiden excels the prejudiced conceptions of 
his times. 1 On the one hand, he presents the slanderous caricatures 
which were current in his day yet he raises her, at once, to a person of 
lofty aims, pure motives, and great achievements, by comparing her 
with Deborah: — 

" Stay, stay thy hands ; thou art an Amazon 
• And fightest with the sword of Deborah." 

All Bible readers know that Deborah was a woman of great note in 
the Hebrew nation : — a prophetess who judged Israel, 2 " the great dame 
of Lapidoth," 3 who was associated with Barak against Sisera in a tri- 
umphant attack which brought freedom from foreign oppression. Thus, 
in a single line, the great dramatist compares the " Maid of Orleans " 
with the only woman in Scripture, or perhaps in all history, whose char- 
acter, genius and experience were so strikingly and uniquely comparable 
with her own. 4 

In Richard III. a Scripture allusion is employed, in a single sen- 
tence, to convey a thought which could not otherwise be so strikingly 
expressed. At the close of the able and eloquent speech of the Bishop 
of Carlisle he says : — 

1 The wonderful saviour of her county, " Joan of Arc," is portrayed by 
Shakspeare with an Englishman's prejudices: yet he at first leaves it doubtful 
whether she has not in reality a heavenly mission; she appears in the pure glory 
of virgin heroism ; by her supernatural eloquence (and this circumstance is of the 
Poet's invention) she wins over the Duke of Burgundy to the French cause." 
Dramatic Literature, A. W. Schlegel. 

"Judges 4:4. 3 Tennyson. 

*If, as some claim, the sketch of Joan was worked into the play by some 
other hand than Shakspeare's these remarks would not appear so apposite. In 
Mr. Mabie's able articles, published in the Outlook, after the above was written, 
he says: "It is difficult to find his (Shakspeare's) hand in the cheap and coarse 
presentation of Joan of Arc, he was incapable of so vulgar a misreading of a 
great career; his insight would have saved him from so gross a blunder." 



54 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPBARB 

". . . This land shall be called 
The field of Golgotha and dead men's skulls." 

A religious imposture, — a so-called miracle, captures the credence and 
sympathy of King Henry VI. In referring to this sham, Shakspeare 
weaves into the play a very obvious reference to the miracle of healing 
of the blind man, recorded in St. John's gospel : — 

One. A miracle ! a miracle ! 

Suf. Come to the king : tell him what miracle. 

One. Forsooth, a blind man at Saint Alban's shrine, 
Within this half hour hath receiv'd his sight ; 
A man that ne'er saw in his life before. 

K. Hen. Now, God be prais'd, that to believing souls 
Gives light in darkness, comfort in despair ! 

Car. Here come the townsmen on procession, 
To present your highness with the man. 

K. Hen. Great is his comfort in this earthly vale, 
Though by his sight his sin be multiplied. 
Good fellow, tell us here the circumstance, 
That we for thee may glorify the Lord. 
What ! hast thou been long blind, and now restor'd ? 

Simp. Born blind, an't please your grace. 

Wife. Ay, indeed, was he. 

Suf. What woman is this? 

Wife. His wife, an't like your worship. 

K. Hen. Poor soul ! God's goodness hath been great to thee : 
Let never day nor night unhallow'd pass, 
But still remember what the Lord hath done. 

// Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

One of the most finished of the works of Shakspeare (which is thought 
by some to have been his last) is the allegorical play of The Tempest. 
According to some authorities the Poet drew some of his material for 
this masterly work from the circumstances of a terrible tempest which 
overcame a fleet of nine ships, leaving England in May, 1609, one of 
which was afterwards reported from the Bermuda Islands (see Hud- 
son's Introduction to the Tempest). This date agrees with the time at 
which Shakspeare wrote the play, or thereabouts. 

But whatever may have been the original source of the Poet's plot it 
is certain that much of its thought and language were suggested to his 



VERSATILITY IN USE OF BIBLE 55 

mind by the Bible. 1 Evidently he had especially in view the wreck of 
St. Paul on the Island of Melita ; — witness the description in Acts xxvii., 
and note especially the 34th verse : " There shall not an hair fall from 
the head of any of you." 

And then read Shakspeare's words : — 

" there is no soul 
No, nor so much perdition as an hair 
Betid to any creature in the vessel." 

Tempest 1: 2. 

After the storm which these words refer to, Ariel tells Prospero that 
"Not a hair perish'd." 

And when Miranda asks, " How came we ashore ?" Prospero replies, 
"By divine Providence." 

In The Tempest Ariel is the Chief Minister of Prospero — a myste- 
rious agent, essential to the play. Where did the Poet find the sugges- 
tion of this figure ? 

The answer to this question is found in the book of Isaiah : "Woe to 
Ariel, to Ariel the city. . . Yet will I distress Ariel and there shall be 
heaviness and sorrow: and it shall be unto me as Ariel. . . And thou 
shalt be brought down and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy 
speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be as one that 
hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper 
out of the dust. . . Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with 
thunder and earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest." — 
Isai. xxix: 1, 2, 4, 6. 

To the Poet's art the passage of thought from Ariel, the city — an 
exhibition of divine justice, to Ariel, a spirit of the air, with a similar 
mission was simple and easy, while the entire conception of Shakspeare's 
Ariel is suggested in the above quotation from Isaiah. 

Again and again Scriptural figures and language occur in The Tem- 
pest. Caliban says : — 

1 Since completing the MS. for this volume the Author has seen for the 
first time a little work by James Rees, entitled "Shakspeare and the Bible," pub- 
lished in Philadelphia in 1876. Mr. Rees treats this subject at greater length and 
says : "There is not to be found in any romance or play, prior to the production 
of ' The Tempest,'' a more remarkable identification with Scripture than that 
contained in this play, and which no other writer but a Shakspeare could have 
so reverently, and so admirably, blended with St. Paul's shipwreck on the Island 
of Melita." 



56 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 



" I'll yield him thee asleep 
Where thou may'st knock a nail into his head," 5: 2. 

an evident allusion to Jael's deed as described in Judges iv. 
When Prospero says: — 

" The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
The solemn temples, the great globe itself, 
Yea, all which it inherit shall dissolve, 
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded 
Leave not a rack behind," 4: 1. 

we naturally recall the words of I Peter iii:io, II. 

All's Well that Ends Well furnishes further illustrations of the 
use of Scripture. When the King of France answers Helena's plea that 
he will try her deceased's father's remedy for the disease which afflicts 
him, the King says : — 

" We thank you maiden ; 
But may not be so credulous of cure, 
When our most learned doctors leave us." 

Helena replies in the terms, and almost the very language, of Scrip- 
ture : — 

" He that of greatest work is finisher 
Oft does them by the weakest minister : 
So holy writ in babes hath judgment shown, 
When judges have been babes." 

And when the King opposes her argument she answers : — 

" Inspired merit so by breath is barr'd ; 
It is not so with Him that all things knows, 
As 'tis with us that square our guess by shows ; 
But most it is presumption in us, when 
The help of Heaven we count the act of men." 

All's Well 2: 1. 



VERSATILITY IN USE OF BIBLE 57 

The maiden's eloquent earnestness eventually wins the King's consent 
to try the remedy. When a cure is effected, all are amazed, and a cour- 
tier remarks : — " They say miracles are past. . . he's of a most facinor- 
ous spirit that will not acknowledge it to be the — very hand of Heaven." 

In the same play (All's Well 1 13) a clown makes a witty answer to a 
Countess, thus : "No, madam, tis not well that I am poor though many 
of the rich are damned." This is, without doubt, an allusion to the 
Scripture saying : "How hardly shall a rich man enter the kingdom of 
Heaven." 

In Cymbeline we notice a reference to the doctrine that suffering and 
punishment are related, — the one to the other : — 

" Will poor folks lie 
That have affliction on them ; knowing 'tis 
A punishment, or trial." 5: 6. 

In the play of Othello an allusion is made to certain Calvinistic doc- 
trines prevalent in Shakspeare's time. Cassio is drunk, and he speaks 
in that half-intelligible sense which often marks a man of education 
when drunk: "Heaven's above all; and there be souls be saved and 
there be souls must not be saved." 

These trifling and sometimes irreverent references to Scripture 
themes which we find current in the language of certain characters in 
Shakspeare are natural and reasonable. Bible talk was so common in 
his day that it was subject to all sorts of confused and absurd paraphras- 
ing. The Poet does not represent frivolous characters as talking with 
reverence of holy subjects, or as quoting the Scriptures with accuracy 
and fitness ; yet he could not portray them fully, as he has done, had he 
omitted these misappropriations of biblical passages and thought. Many 
passages of Scripture are lightly and irreverently employed, but always 
by such characters, and under such circumstances, as might be expected. 
For example, in act 3 of the Comedy oe Errors some men appear on 
the stage ; — a courtesan enters and the following conversation ensues : — 

Ant. S. Satan avoid! I charge thee, tempt me not! 
Dro. S. Master, is this mistress Satan? 
Ant. S. It is the Devil. 

Dro. S. It is written, they appear to men like angels of light 
. . . marry, he must have a long spoon that must eat with the Devil. 



5 8 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

In the same play is this allusion to the New Testament account of 
Christ commanding the Devil to depart from a man : — 

" I charge thee, Satan, hous'd within this man 
To yield possession to my holy prayers." 4: 4. 

In All's Well that Ends Well there is a speech in which Scrip- 
tural figurative terms are mixed up in a strange kind of jumble, yet in a 
way that is consistent with the character of the clown who makes it : — 

" I am a woodland fellow, sir, that always loved a great fire ; and the 
master I speak of ever keeps a good fire. 1 But sure he is the prince of 
this world; 2 let his nobility remain in his court. I am for the house 
with the narrow gate 3 which I take to be too little for pomp to enter, 
some that humble themselves may; but the many will be too chill and 
tender, and they'll be for the flowery way 4 that leads to the broad gate 3 
and the great fire !" 4: 5. 

Another admixture of religious phrases with ignorance and folly 
occurs in the play of Henry V. Falstaff is reported dead, and a con- 
versation takes place in Mrs. Quickly's disreputable house, where are 
gathered a few of the followers of the "unsavory knight" : — 

"Bard. Would I were with him, wheresome'er he is, either in heaven, 
or in hell ! 

Quick. Nay, sure, he's not in hell: he's in Arthur's bosom, if ever 
man went to Arthur's bosom. A 'made a finer end, and went away, an it 
had been any christom 5 child; a' parted ev'n just between twelve and 
one, ev'n at the turning o' the tide : for after I saw him fumble with 
the sheets, and play with the flowers, and smile upon his finger's end, I 
knew there was but one way ; for his nose was as sharp as a pen, and a' 
babbled of green fields. How now, Sir John ? quoth I : what, man ! be 
of good cheer. So a' cried out — God, God, God ! three or four times : 

4 Matt. 25:41. 'John 12:31, and 14:30. s Matt. 7:13, 14. *Job 14:2 and 
James 1 : 10, 11. 

5 Christom is a Quickly form of chrisom. A chrisom-child was one that died 
within a month after the birth ; so called from the chrisom, which was a white 
cloth put upon the child at baptism, and used for its shroud, in case it did not 
outlive the first month. The term was derived from the chrism, that is, the 
anointing, which made a part of baptism before the Reformation. Footnote in 
Hudson's Shakspeare. 



VERSATILITY IN USE OF BIBLE 59 

now I, to comfort him, bid him a' should not think of God; I hop'd 
there was no need to trouble himself with any such thoughts yet." 2:3. 
This is a perfectly natural speech coming from such a source at such 
a time. The woman (Quickly) had been awed by the death-scene, and 
memories of her early, crude, religious education were recalled. She 
remembered the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, although, in her 
ignorance, she spoke of "Arthur's bosom" instead of Abraham's and 
she had a confused memory of the twenty-third Psalm, while FalstafT 
"babbled of green fields." 

In the play of Antony and Cleopatra are several references to 
Herod of Jewry. An Egyptian woman named Charmian says: "Let 
me have a child at fifty to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage." It 
was Herod of Jewry (Herod the Great) whose fear of the young child 
Jesus led him to inquire of the Wise Men of the East and say to them, 
"Go, and search diligently for the young child ; and when ye have found 
him bring me word again that I may come and worship him also." It 
was to Egypt that the mother of Jesus fled with her babe to escape from 
the hand of Herod. Commenting upon this play, Steeven says : "Char- 
" mian wishes for a son who may arrive to such power and dominion 
" that the proudest and fiercest monarch of the earth may be brought 
" under his yoke." 

The death of Antiochus in the play of Pericles very forcibly reminds 
us of the death of King Herod as may be seen in the parallel of the fol- 
lowing passages : — 

"And upon a certain day Herod, arrayed in royal apparel, sat upon 
his throne, and made an oration unto them. And the people gave a 
shout saying, it is the voice of a god, and not of a man. And imme- 
diately the angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the 
glory : and he was eaten of worms and gave up the ghost." 

Acts xii, 21: 23. 

Hel. No, Escames; know this of me, 
Antiochus from incest liv'd not free: 
For which the most high gods, not minding longer 
To withhold the vengeance, that they had in store, 
Due to this heinous capital offence; 
Even in the height and pride of all his glory, 
When he was seated in a chariot of 



60 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

An inestimable value, and his daughter 
With him, a fire from heaven came and shrivell'd up 
Those bodies, even to loathing ; for they so stunk, 
That all those eyes ador'd them ere their fall, 
Scorn now their hand should give them burial. 

Esca. 'Twas very strange. 

Hel. And yet but justice; for though 

This king were great, his greatness was no guard 
To bar heaven's shaft, but sin had his reward. 2: 4. 

In Act 5, Scene I, of Measure; for Measure, when Isabella presses 
for justice one is reminded of the parable of the importunate widow in 
Luke xviii: — 

" O worthy prince, dishonor not your eye 
By throwing it on any other object, 
Till you have heard me in my true complaint 
And given me justice, justice, justice, justice !" 

In the Merchant OE Venice Shylock expresses his contempt for 
Launcelot with a Scripture figure : — 

" What says that fool of Hagar's offspring ?" 

And when the Jew whets his knife to cut the Merchant's flesh the 
Poet makes the witty Gratiano say : — 

" Not on thy sole, but on thy soul, harsh Jew, 
Thou mak'st thy knife keen ; but no metal can, 
No, not the hangman's axe, bear half the keenness 
Of thy sharp envy. Can no prayers pierce thee ?" 4: 1. 

These allusions are often so subtle that, as Sprague says, "we who 
know less of the Scripture are sometimes slow to catch them." See for 
instance how Shakspeare uses the word " manna." Fair ladies you drop 
manna on the way of starved people 5:1. Evidently he alludes to the 
provision of manna for the starving Israelites. 

Even the clownish Launcelot quotes the Scriptures : — 

" The sins of the father are to be laid upon the children." 5: 5. 



VERSATILITY IN USE OF BIBLE 61 

In Midsummer Night's Dream there is a parody on Paul's eloquent 
words in I Cor. xi : 9. Bottom, the weaver, in a ludicrous account of a 
dream, says : "The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not 
seen, man's hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his 
heart to report, what my dream was." 4: 1. Such an absurd paraphra- 
sing of that sublime passage would be monstrous if it were dragged into 
the play, but it is so consistent and so natural to the clownish Bottom 
that one feels that it is neither irrelevant nor irreverent. 

These are but a few illustrations of the Poet's versatile employment 
of the Scriptures. His Biblical allusions are found in every page of his 
greater plays and his poems constantly reveal some spiritual thought. 
One cannot read any of his works, with an open mind, without being fre- 
quently surprised with a gem, hitherto undiscovered and the Bible is 
very frequently its source. 

Many persons wonder that Shakspeare did not more fully and literally 
quote Scripture, but almost invariably alludes to it and expresses its 
thoughts and teachings in his own words. In this respect the Poet 
treated Scripture as he did all other literature. He very rarely quoted 
anything, but of all that his mind was familiar with, he unconsciously 
wove into the text of his writings in his own language. 

The author of a recently published book makes a suggestion which is 
of interest in this connection: "With peculiar care and delicacy he 
" (Shakspeare) avoids quoting the text of Scripture, lest he should 
" incur the reproof of, or offend the clergy, and thus defeat his happy 
" purpose of pointing to the Word of life. He therefore ingeniously 
" endeavors to awaken the curiosity of the ignorant, and enliven the 
*' devout intelligence of Scripture readers and all church members by 
" his method of application. In his Poems he pursues an entirely differ- 
" ent course, abstaining from an open reference to Bible figures incident 
" to its teachings, he breathes out spiritual truth in figurative language 
" full of devout aspirations, presenting out of his own secret experience, 
" the corruption of the natural heart and the discovered remedy in the 
" new man, Christ Jesus." 1 

If the student of the Bible and of Shakspeare will keep in mind the 
suggestion of this short chapter he will find that in many of the Poet's 
works, Scripture allusions may be seen shining out on every page, as 
one may see stars in the heavens which do not appear to the casual 
observer. 

1 Christ in Shakspeare. By Charles Ellis,— (London, 1897). 



II 

TYPES OF CHARACTER FROM SCRIPTURE 

Whether or not Shakspeare sought for his types in the Bible it is 
certain that there is a striking similarity in many of them ; as seen in 
his references to Cain, the Prodigal Son, Judas, Herod, Pilate, etc. 
And many of his typical characters and illustrations were drawn from 
the Scriptures. He selects a Jew to represent mercenary meanness and 
vindictive revenge, and a Bible character is employed to furnish the 
portrait. Shylock defends his trade of usury by Jacob's trick in secur- 
ing for himself the better portion of his uncle Laban's flock. This he 
claims as a perfect example, for he says : — 

" When Jacob graz'd his uncle Laban's sheep, 
This Jacob from our holy Abraham was 
As his wise mother wrought in his behalf 
The third possessor ; ay, he was the third." 

Mer. of Ven. 1:3. 

Jacob is Shylock's pattern and saint ; by him he swears : "By Jacob's 
staff I swear." 

In the opening words of the play Antonio expresses a sense of sad- 
ness which he seems to be unable to account for; but his friends think 
that, with all his wealth and interests "tossing on the ocean," he may 
well be troubled. Salarino says: — 

" Believe me, Sir, had I such venture forth, 
The better part of my affections would 
Be with my hopes abroad. . . . 
. . . Should I go to church 
And see the holy edifice of stone, 
And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks, 
Which, touching but my gentle vessel's side, 
Would scatter all her spices on the stream ?" i:i. 

62 



TYPES OF CHARACTER FROM SCRIPTURE 63 

When the dramatist would paint the portrait of Shylock's opposite, 
he seems to have had in mind Paul's "perad venture for a good man 
some would even dare to die." At the critical moment, Antonio says to 
his friend for whom he is bond : — 

" Repent not that you shall lose your friend, 
And he repents not that he pays your debt ; 
For, if the Jew do cut but deep enough, 
I'll pay it instantly with all my heart." 4:1. 

Again, in Cymbeune, is a story which is very suggestive of David 
and Goliath ; Cloten, the braggart son of the King, finds Guiderius in 
the forest who is, unknown to himself, also a son of the King, but 
living, from his infancy, a rude shepherd's life, with a banished lord. 
Cloten addresses the youth in the style of a bully: "What slave art 
thou — Art not afraid ?" 

To which the young man courageously answers : — 

"Those that I reverence, those I fear; the wise. 
At fools I laugh, not fear them." 

Attacking him with his sword, Cloten boastfully exclaims : — 

" Die the death : 
When I have slain thee with my own proper hand, 
I'll follow those that even now fled hence, 
And on the gates of Lud's town set your heads." 

They retire from the scene fighting, and in short order Guiderius 
returns, bearing the boastful prince's head, and says : — 

" With his own sword 
Which he did wave against my throat, I have ta'en 
His head from him." Cymb. 4:2. 

A more generally recognized draft upon the Bible for types of char- 
acter is found in the play of Macbeth, which is treated at some length 
in the chapter on " Tragedy in the Bible and Shakspeare." 

The play of Hamlet stands alone. It is the crowning study of the 
great Shakspeare. It has no parallel in all literature. Hamlet himself, 



64 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

as Shakspeare painted him, is more than a type ; he is multi-type. He 
is the problem of mankind, — the human mystery personified. 1 

There is no other single character in all literature about whom critics 
differ so widely, and it seems probable, as Schlegel suggests, that every 
new student of this colossal sphinx will differ with all others " in his 
view of the connection and the significance of all the parts." On the 
one question, of the "madness" of Hamlet, the ablest of critics differ as 
widely as possible. Lowell says: "If Hamlet is irresponsible the whole 
is chaos;" while Hudson says: "In plain terms Hamlet is mad." 
Richard Grant White says : "Nothing should be kept more clearly in 
mind than that from the time we hear of him (Hamlet) until his death 
he was perfectly sane, and a man of very clear and quick intellectual 
perceptions — one perfectly responsible for his every act and every word ; 
that is, as responsible as a man can be who is constitutionally irresolute, 
purposeless, and procrastinating." Coleridge says: "Hamlet's wild- 
ness is but half false." Mr. Snider has, we think, stated the case cor- 
rectly when he says: "Hamlet's insanity is feigned, his immediate 
object being to deceive Polonius and the court, in order that he might 
more surely pursue his greater and more ultimate object — the discovery 
and punishment of the King's guilt. 2 

Of all the great characters of Shakspeare, Hamlet was the most nega- 
tive in the realm of faith. As Lowell says, he "is the most eminently a 
metaphysician and psychologist." Yet, we notice that Hamlet is con- 
stantly standing on holy ground. He is ever near the mysterious and 
the profoundly religious. Even in his most skeptical moods he 
impresses us more with the realities, which he doubts, than he could do, 
if he declared himself a believer in them. Death and Immortality are 
constantly in view. (See Chap. 7.) 

Whatever other material Shakspeare had in his possession when he 
produced this masterly portrait, we may see that he drew largely from 
Scripture. The whole play abounds in allusions which cannot be mis- 
taken. 

The religious and philosophic aspects of Hamlet find a counterpart 
in some of the characteristics of Job. Very much of the tone and color 

^he drama is severe. Truth doubts it. Sincerity lies in it. Nothing more 
vast, nothing more subtle. In this tragedy, which is at the same time a phil- 
osophy, all is fluid, all hesitates, delays, wavers, is decomposed, scattered, dissi- 
pated, the thought is mist, the will is vapor, resolution crepuscular, the action 
changes every instant, the compass rules the man. . . . Hamlet is the chef- 
d'oeuvre of tragedy dreaming." Victor Hugo. 

3 The Shakspeare Drama. Denton I. Snider. 



TYPES OF CHARACTER FROM SCRIPTURE 65 

of Hamlet's dress and speech, in his more serious, as well as in his 
cynical moments, are like those of Job. The speech of Hamlet to his 
two friends would sound quite natural, if addressed by Job to his "com- 
forters." And it is noticeable that the idea of acting the part of watch- 
ful counselors was much the same in both cases. Rosencrantz and 
Guildenstern, two friends of Hamlet, are directed by the King to watch 
the prince in his strange moods and doubtful actions, and it is in con- 
nection with these that Hamlet offers some of the profoundest wit of 
the play. 

So likewise Job's three friends, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, "made 
an appointment together" to watch and comfort Job in his strange 
affliction and it was in their conversations that we find many of the pro- 
found utterances which abound in the Book. 

To his "friends" Hamlet says : "Why, look you now, how unworthy 
a thing you make of me. You would play upon me ; you seem to know 
my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery; you would 
sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass." 3: 2. 

To his " friends " Job says : — " Do ye imagine to reprove words, and 
the speeches of one that is desperate, which are as wind ?" And again 
he asks : "Am I a sea or a whale that thou settest a watch over me ?" 

It is significant that Hamlet uses the same figure (a whale) in his 
parry with Polonius, occurring immediately after the conversation from 
which the above quotation is taken. And again, when Job in his satire 
says : " No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you " 
we have one of those sayings that is so much like Hamlet that it has 
been quoted as his. 

Hamlet was a man of moods — overweighted with a sense of responsi- 
bility and care ; and there were times when this also was true of Job. In 
his great sorrow Job cries out to be hidden in the grave, and exclaims : 
"If a man die shall he live again?" And Hamlet puts the same question 
in another form in that well-known exclamation, "To be, or not to be, 
that is the question." 

With a fine appreciation of man's nobility and majesty of character 
Hamlet exclaims : "What a piece of work is a man !" At another time 
his thought took opposite direction, as to the baser and sensuous quali- 
ties of man, and he inquires : — 

" What is a man 
If his chief good, and market of his time, 
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more." 
5 



66 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

He recognizes God's purpose in relation to man, for he adds : — 

" Sure He that made us with such large discourse 
Looking before and after, gave us not 
That capability and godlike reason, 
To fust in us unused." 4: 4. 

We find the parallel of this in Job's noble exclamation: "What is 
man that thou shouldest magnify him ? and that thou shouldest set thine 
heart upon him?" Job vii. 17. 

In the final result there is no parallel, but an opposite, in Hamlet and 
Job. Hamlet comes to the inevitable failure of a life unbalanced and 
undirected. His mind constantly reverted to the verities of religion, but 
he had no positive faith in God. He was, as a noble ship without 
anchor, and without a port. He takes vengeance in his own hand and is 
controlled by a leaning to fate. Even the Scriptural doctrine of Provi- 
dence he twists into an argument of fatalism. He says: "There's a 
special providence in the fall of a sparrow." But he treats this doctrine 
as an utterance of the inevitable, and adds : "If it be now, 'tis not to 
come ; if it be not to come, it will be now ; if it be not now, yet it will 
come." 5: 2. 

But Job, who is sometimes on the verge of despair, yet ever rises. He 
says: "My soul is weary of my life." In his gloom he is on a level 
with Hamlet's cry of "The undiscovered country, from whose bourn no 
traveller returns — " for he says, "Before I go whence I shall not return, 
even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death." But he rises 
out of this darkness into the full light : "For I know that my Redeemer 
liveth." 

It is true that one may scan the plot of this marvelous creation of 
Shakspeare's without perceiving these spiritual truths and analogies, 
yet, we think, no one can study it, in any of its parts, without finding 
gems of Scripture truths in every page of it. 

This chapter serves to emphasize the fact of our Poet's drafts upon 
the Bible for character-types ; but further illustrations, such as Ahab and 
Jezebel, as suggestive of Macbeth, and Ariel in the Tempest will 
be found in the other chapters of Book III. 



Ill 

HBROBS AND HEROINES 

It is remarkable that he, whose perception of character was so acute, 
has no great moral heroes. There are many men in his dramas who 
display certain moral qualities in an eminent degree, but as Ruskin says : 
"Shakspeare has no heroes ; he has only heroines." 1 

Antonio is a merchant of the strictest honor and integrity : he is pre- 
pared to die by the sharp blade of the insatiate Jew, for the honor of his 
bond and the love of his friend. 

But Antonio, who has a heart stout enough, and a friendship pure 
enough, even to die for his friend, is not a harmonious moral hero. His 
love is restricted to his friends. He indulges in race prejudice and is 
bitter in hatred towards his enemy which, in some measure, excuses the 
vindictiveness of Shylock. When he goes to sign the bond, in order 
that his friend may have the present loan, Shylock accuses him of con- 
duct the very reverse of the Christian rule : — 

" You call me — misbeliever, cut-throat dog, 

And spet upon my Jewish gaberdine, 

And all for the use of that which is mine own. 

Well, then, now it appears you need my help : 

Go, to, then ; you come to me, and you say, 
' Shylock, we would have monies :' You say so ; 

You, that did void your rheum upon my beard, 

And foot me as you spurn a stranger cur 

Over your threshold : . . . 

. . . You call'd me dog." 

Antonio acknowledges the truth of this charge, but not with humil- 
iation or regret. He seems to glory in it, as of conduct of which he has 
reason to be proud. He says : — 

1 Sesame and Lilies. 

67 



68 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

" I am as like to call thee so again, 
To spet on thee again, to spurn thee, too. 
If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not 
As to thy friends. . . . 
But lend it rather to thine enemy." i:j. 

Out of this strange interview comes the still more strange contract of 
the "pound of flesh." And when Shylock demands the bond, he says : — 

" I have sworn on my oath that I will have my bond 
Thou call'dst me dog before thou had'st a cause." 5:5. 

Certainly Antonio laid himself open to this retort. It was unworthy 
of him, as a Christian merchant, and it subjected him to a measure of 
righteous scorn when he pleaded for mercy at the hands of the Jew. 
Moreover, as Ruskin says, "the Merchant of Venice is languidly sub- 
missive to adverse fortune." 

In Shakspeare all the Kings, Cardinals, Soldiers, Knights and Priests 
are men of great faults. Not one of his men presents a perfect or har- 
monious moral portrait, while most of them are personifications of 
human weaknesses and sins and crimes. Brutus is great in some of his 
nobler movements, but the "noblest Roman of them all" is not a hero 
whom one might command as a type and an example. 

But the Poet saw the finer virtues and the greater qualities of 
humanity, and did not fail to embody them in his gallery of portraits. 
They are found, as Ruskin points out, in his female characters. The 
women of Shakspeare are, mostly, the very soul of the virtues. In 
them he sets forth the perfectly balanced character, portraying love — 
domestic and filial, — chastity, tenderness, patience, forbearance, and even 
the sterner virtues of courage and endurance, combined with wit and 
skill. 

On the other hand, Shakspeare saw that if Woman does not rise 
towards the purity of angels she may sink down to the level of devils. 
And yet there is consistency in all his portraitures of female character. 
Mrs. Jameson, in her "Characteristics of Women," remarks on this 
fact: "When we read in history of the enormities of certain women, 
" perfect scarecrows and ogresses, we can safely, like the Pharisee in 
" Scripture, hug ourselves in our secure virtue, and thank God that we 
" are not as others are — but the wicked women in Shakspeare are por- 
" trayed with such perfect consistency and truth that they leave us no 



HEROES AND HEROINES 69 

" such resource — they frighten us into reflection — they make us believe 
" and tremble. On the other hand, his amiable women are touched 
" with such exquisite simplicity — they have so little pretensions — and 
" are so unlike the usual heroines of tragedy and romance, that they 
" delight us more 'than all the nonsense of the beau-ideal.' ' : 

Shakspeare's women are always in harmony with the sex; they are 
never unsexed, whether in the pursuit of a heroic moral purpose, or 
moved by wicked or immoral passions. Sometimes they clothe them- 
selves in male attire, in order the better to achieve the end in view, or 
to meet the dangers of travel and adventure ; but when they do so, they 
are uniformly chaste and orderly in behavior. Wicked women who are 
the very embodiment of unadulterated sin are yet true to the female 
instincts. Goneril, the leading evil-spirit of the two wicked daughters 
of King Lear, is almost conscienceless. Albany holds up the glass to 
her, as he says : — 

" See thyself, devil ! 
Proper deformity seems not in the fiend 
So horrid as in woman !" 

One feels the truth of this. And yet Goneril is feminine ; if she be a 
devil, she is a she-devil. 

And so the Courtesan-queen, Cleopatra, never appears unfeminine, 
even in her most intrepid and fearless deeds, down to the very manner 
of her suicide. 

Lady Macbeth, too, is female all through. She moves and thinks 
and reasons as a woman. Conscience speaks to her, as to Macbeth, but 
she acts differently. Even the same thought of a blood-stain'd hand is 
expressed differently. Macbeth talks of all the waters of the ocean, as 
insufficient to "wash this blood clean from my hand," while she exclaims 
"all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand." 

But in all the works of Shakspeare we must look to his women, 
rather than to his men, for the truly heroic and the greater virtues. 
Many of his plays depend upon the female characters, not only to sus- 
tain interest in the plot, but also to give to them meaning and purpose. 

Take for example the play of Measure for Measure. If Isabella 
were omitted it would be shorn of its glory ; it would be, almost as the 
play of Hamlet without Hamlet, — with this difference : — that while the 
interest of Hamlet centers in the intellectual study of a phenomenal men- 
tality, Isabella is an irresistible portraiture of the highest form of moral 
purity and mediatorial character. 



70 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

She is an opposite of Portia. Portia sees in herself an instrument to 
work out the redemption of her husband's friend. She is self-assured, 
— confident — and needs no urging, or even a suggestion from others. 
Isabella is bashful and doubtful of her ability and influence. When 
urged to intercede for her brother's life, she says : — 

" Alas ! what poor ability is in me 
To do him good ? . . My power I doubt !" 

She shrinks, too, from entering upon a task so foreign to her maiden 
life and religious vow. When once aroused, however, she throws all 
her fears to the winds and enters upon her task with courage, prompt- 
ness and unresting diligence. 

Her plea is based on mercy. She offers no excuse for her brother's 
fault; — she claims only that mercy's function may be fitly and justly 
employed in his case. And the terms of her plea are so like those which 
Portia urges upon Shylock, both in spirit and argument, that she ranks, 
intellectually, almost with Portia herself. Her argument with the Dep- 
uty is carried forward with singular beauty of thought and deep relig- 
ious conviction and fervor. But while she pleads, Angelo looks coldly 
on and tells her "it is too late": — her brother is sentenced. One can 
almost see the beauty of her face enhanced by her enthusiasm as she 
exclaims : — 

"Too late ? Why no : I that do speak a word 
May call it back again." 

To her eloquent pleading Angelo cooly replies : — 

"Your brother is a forfeit of the law 
And you but waste your words." 

Isabella is prompt with an appeal of the very finest order of thought 
and argument, coupled with the rarest and purest religious faith and 
fervor. What will those, who dispute the religious element in Shak- 
speare, do with such a plea as this? — 

"Alas! Alas! 
Why, all the souls that were, were forfeit once: 
And he that might the vantage best have took 
Found out the remedy. How would you be, 



HEROES AND HEROINES 71 

If He which is at top of judgment should 
But judge you as you are? O, think on that; 
And mercy then will breathe within your lips 
Like man new made." 

How our heroine grows ! Each step in her movement is like the 
eagle's flight, it gains in strength as it reaches toward the height. 

Virtue is quick to discover the presence of Vice. Isabella has a con- 
viction that she is doing battle with something other than mere extreme 
justice. Her blows fall thick and fast as she tells the deputy that: — 

" Authority, though it err like others, 

Hath yet a kind of medicine to itself 

That skins the vice o' the top." 

Go to your bosom," — she says ; 
" Knock there, and ask your heart, what it doth know 

That's like my brother's fault : if it confess 

A natural guiltiness, such as his, 

Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue 

Against my brother's life." 

Ah ! here Isabella is the true preacher, striking home to the conscience 
of the deputy ! She has disturbed him ! She knows not the devil she 
has awakened in him, but she is prepared to hear him say, "Come again 
tomorrow !" The morrow comes and, in the interview, Angelo presses 
himself upon her virgin honor. 

If ever shock comes to such a soul as Isabella it is when she discovers 
the depth of infamy of an Angelo's proposition. He who sat as judge — 
whose zeal for the law, in the name of social purity, had outrun justice 
and mercy — who had condemned her brother and sentenced him to 
death for " a natural guiltiness," now proposes to her the self-same sin 
as the price of that brother's life. Would that this irony of morals 
were never found except in the play ! 

One can imagine that Isabella's heart stops beating for a brief moment 
as the real significance of that hypocritical question dawns upon her. If 
there were : — 

" No earthly means to save him, but that either 
You must lay down the treasures of your body 
— or else let him suffer 
What would you do ?" 



72 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

This was Isabella's Gethsemane. Her brother's life put in the bal- 
ance against her own purity. The bright young life of a man who has 
done no wrong against society that he is not willing to atone for, — who 
longs to take the full measure of responsibility of husband and father, — 
this life placed in the scale against her virgin honor. But her answer is 
ready. What would I do ? Do? 

" As much for my poor brother as myself 
That is, were I under the terms of death, 
The impression of keen whips I'd wear as rubies 
And strip my self to death as to a bed 
That longing had been sick for, ere I'd yield 
My body up to shame." 

And when Angelo tells her : "Then must your brother die." She is 
still equal to the strain : — 

" Better it were a brother die 
Than a sister, by redeeming him 
Should die forever! 
Ignominy in ransom and free pardon 
Are of two houses : lawful mercy 
Is nothing kin to foul redemption." 

There spake the true redeeming spirit ! This is the very bugle sound 
of heaven's law. Ransom purchased by sin is not pardon. Mercy has 
no relation to unholy purchase. Pardon is free, or it is not pardon. To 
be ransomed by sin ! to be redeemed by foul unholy compact, to make 
terms with death that life may be spared ! this would be a shock against 
all moral law; it would make angels weep and devils laugh. 

But poor Isabella has not yet drank her cup of sorrow to the dregs. 
Her next trial is with her brother who is lying in prison awaiting the 
issue of her prayers, — pardon or death. 

She has faith in her brother ! What pure woman has not ? She never 
thinks her own blood relations weak and vile for "love thinketh no 
evil." 

Isabella has failed with Angelo, but she sees virtue in her brother 
notwithstanding his fall : — 



HEROES AND HEROINES 73 

" I'll to my brother 
Though he hath fallen by prompture of the blood, 
Yet he hath in him such a mind of honour, 
That had he twenty heads to tender down 
On twenty bloody blocks, he'd yield them up 
Before his sister should her body stoop 
To such abhor'd pollution." 

How joyfully she hears him say: — 

" If I must die, 
I will encounter darkness as a bride, 
And hung it in mine arms." 

" There spake my brother ! there my father's grave did utter forth 
a voice." But she has not yet told him the deep damnation of the 
deputy. That he can be redeemed at a price which she alone can pay 
her brother does not know, much less has she named the nature of the 
coin demanded. When this is told him the young man, at first, recoils 
with horror, — " Thou shalt not do it," he says. But, as he takes time to 
think of the precious treasure of life — the pleasure, the joy, the impulse 
of his youthful days, he changes his tone and sighs : "Oh Isabel ! 
Death is a fearful thing." The horror of death falls upon him and — 
the 'afterwards': — 

" Ay but to die and go we know not where !" 

Who can ever tell the awful sense of loss when our ideals fail ? We 
have placed our father, our brother, or our sister on a pinnacle, high 
above the common herd of men and women, and when bankruptcy of 
heart is revealed, it is as the crack of doom. 

" Sweet sister, let me live : 
What sin you do to save a brother's life, 
Nature dispenses with the deed so far, 
That it becomes a virtue !" 

There ! it is out ! that's the same old devil's argument ; — "Cast thy- 
self down and He shall give his angels charge over thee !" Nature does 
not reject a compromise with evil to do a greater good. Nature makes 
a virtue of a sin when to do it gains a crown, or saves a life ! 



74 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

These are the plausible theories of men who desire gain by sin. But 
Isabella's clear soul instantly detects the defection and, while she is 
shocked at her brother's weakness, she feels that moral redemption is 
not possible on such terms. "Fie, fie, fie !" she says. "Thy sin's not 
accidental but a trade !" 

Life for a life? Yes! Life for the sinner? Yes! But a trade in 
sin ! Never ! A sin to redeem a sinner ? It is neither in nature or in 
mercy. The law of salvation has no place for a sinner by another's sin. 

And this is the very heart of this play. It is a drama of intercession. 
The whole scheme and purpose of it is mediatorial. It shows society 
disrupted and discordant by a common corruption — ignoring domestic 
ties, giving license and loose rein to sensual sins and the way to 
redemption is mediation. The Duke himself acts the part, but the great, 
noble soul of Isabella is the heroic mediator, who carries the pain and 
sacrifice of it and is ready to die for it. 

Thus, it is Isabella (a woman) who nobly contests the dangerous 
way against the lust and power of Angelo: — in the end she saves her 
brother from death and justice from defeat. No stronger test of heroic 
character could be possible than that which assailed her and she proved 
herself equal to the task. 1 

So also, it is Portia who is the heroic character in The Merchant of 
Venice. She saves Antonio, not Antonio, Portia. And as Mrs. Jame- 
son says of her, referring to the trial scene : "Her intellectual powers, 
her elevated sense of religion, her high honorable principles, her best 
feelings as a woman, are all displayed." 2 

It is the lovely Cordelia, who, grandly and patiently, bears the bit- 
terest wrongs to save King Lear, her father, from the effects of his 
own weakness. 

It is Desdemona who, although she is weak, is pure and spotless, 
amidst a network of lying and slander, and who is the one transparent 
light of love and fidelity to the end of the tragedy and wreck of the 
play of Othello. " She is a victim consecrated from the first, — ' an offer- 
ing without blemish,' alone worthy of the grand final sacrifice, all har- 
mony, all grace, all purity, all tenderness, all truth !" 3 

1 Isabella, who, on the point of taking the veil, is yet prevailed upon by sisterly 
affection to tread again the perplexing ways of the world, while, amid the general 
corruption, the heavenly purity of her mind is not even stained with one unholy 
thought : in the humble robes of the novice she is a very angel of light. A. W. 
Schlegel. 

2 Characteristics of Women. 

3 Ibid. 



HEROES AND HEROINES 75 

It is Helena, whose perfect love patiently waits the leadings of provi- 
dence, through years of banishment and contumely; and never falters, 
until she finally proves to the proud Bertram her all-sacrificing love; 
and, — well she says : — 

" Our remedies oft in themselves do lie 
Which we ascribe to heaven." 

It is not Romeo, but Juliet, who displays the courage of patience and 
endurance to the end. She steadily appeals to her father, her mother, 
her nurse, and to the Friar, in turns ; and then braves suffering and 
death in their most loathsome forms, in order that she may "live an 
unstained wife." But Romeo is weak at the moment when courage 
might have saved all. 

And Imogen, in the play of Cymbeune, — although involved in the 
meshes of skillful plots designed for her ruin, — her banishment accom- 
plished, — and her murder planned by her own husband ; yet she never 
forsakes her love, but keeps it burning upon the altar of her heart, 
amidst a very hell of conspiring iniquity that might make devils blush. 

Ruskin, in his view of Shakspeare's galaxy of heroines, remarks 
that : "Among all the principal figures there is only one weak woman — 
" Ophelia ; and it is because she fails Hamlet at the critical moment, 
" and is not, and cannot in her nature be, a guide to him when he needs 
" her most, that all the bitter catastrophe follows. Though there are 
" three wicked women among the principal figures, — Lady Macbeth, 1 
" Regan, and Goneril, they are felt at once to be exceptions to the ordi- 
" nary laws of life ; fatal in their influence also, in proportion to the 
" power for good which they have abandoned. Such in broad light, is 
" Shakspeare's testimony to the position and character of women in 
" human life. He represents them as infallibly faithful and wise coun- 
" selors, — incorruptibly just and pure examples — strong always to sanc- 
" tity, even when they cannot save." Sesame and Lilies. 

Equally true is Shakspeare's conception of the marriage relation. 2 As 
Coleridge says : "Except in Shakspeare, you can find no such thing as 
a pure conception of wedded love in our old dramatists." How perfectly 

1 Mr. Ruskin omits Gertrude, the mother of Hamlet from his list of "wicked 
women," perhaps because he does not regard her as classed among "the principal 
figures" of Shakspeare, but why he has omitted Cleopatra is not so clear. 

1 See Chapter IV ; Moral Inculcations. 



76 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

he sets forth the nice distinctions between the respective relations of 
father and husband. Desdemona says : — 

"My noble father 
I do perceive here a divided duty: 
To you I am bound for life and education ; 
My life and education both do teach me 
How to respect you ; You are the lord of duty ; — 
I am hitherto your daughter : But here's my husband ; 
And so much duty as my mother show'd 
To you, preferring you before her father, 
So much I challenge that I may profess 
Due to the Moor, my lord." Othello i: j. 

The Portia's of Julius Caesar, and of The Merchant of Venice 
are noble examples of wedded love ; and Queen Katherine in Henry 
VIII. tells her own sweet story of devotion and pure love. 

Even in his earlier Poems, the lofty purity of true womanhood caught 
the fire of Shakspeare's genius. His Sonnets often breathe the purest 
thought and express the loftiest ideas of virtue. And, in the Rape oe 
Lucrece, while vividly portraying black, hellish, lust and crime ; he also 
gives a perfect picture of chastity and loyal wifehood, — stronger than 
life itself: — Lucrece, pure as Desdemona and a much stronger character. 



IV 

THB MORAL INCULCATIONS OF SHAKSPBARB 

Prof. R. G. Moulton in his excellent work on "Shakspeare as a 
Dramatic Artist," speaks of "the dangerous tendency which exists 
among ordinary readers of Shakspeare, to ignore plot, as of secondary 
importance, and to look for his greatness mainly in his conceptions of 
character." But "the full character effect," he says, "cannot be grasped 
if it be dissociated from the plot." 

This is a note of warning to which another might be added. Many 
readers, in looking for the plot miss the characters, while others in 
studying the stage-setting of the drama, see nothing of the lofty incul- 
cations and inspirations which it contains. We shall see more of Shak- 
speare in proportion as we view his works as an expression of those high 
attributes which associate the human soul with the divine character. We 
obtain glimpses of man's moral and spiritual nature as we scan the plot 
or study the personnel of the plays. But if we view these, as incidents 
which set forth the greater things, we shall discover that the perfection 
of Shakspeare's art is not in the skillfulness of his plot, or the faithful 
portraiture of his men and women, but in his masterly expressions of 
the human soul, in all its passions and emotions, its hopes and fears, its 
loves and hates, and its relation to the infinite and divine.' 

As, in Millet's great picture, the two humble peasants standing in 
reverential attitude, at the moment when the sound of the Angelus bell 
is heard from the direction of the distant sunset, are but incidents which 
to the spiritually minded, bring the soul into instant rapport with prayer 
and worship, so the figures which move in natural order upon the can- 
vas of Shakspeare's immortal paintings are each an expression of some 
quality of the human soul, for good or evil, for life or death, for heaven 
or hell. 

The moral tone of .Shakspeare, as of all great artists, must be meas- 
ured, not by any one figure of his pictures, nor by the whole of any one 
picture, but by the spirit which he breathes, — the atmosphere which he 
creates. Dr. Strong is a witness on this subject. He says: "After 
" earnest searching I can unhesitatingly avow the belief that the great 

77 



78 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

" dramatist was both pure in his moral teaching and singularly sound 
" in faith. There is a freedom of utterance with regard to the relations 
" of the sexes, such as is natural in a bold and vigorous age, but there is 
"no lingering over sensual details." 1 

The world is only just beginning to understand the moral worth of 
Shakspeare. With the thought turned, too exclusively, towards his ear- 
lier poems, and his free descriptions of the grosser passions, he has been 
regarded as an artist whose pictures are not for the school or the family 
library, — as a poet of tainted morals — a genius whose great work is 
darkened with a black shadow. 

Taine, in his History of English Literature, quite freely expressed 
this view,— and yet the notoriety of Taine's work rests largely upon his 
liberal selection of passages and quotations from literature, many of 
which ought never to have been written, and others, like those from 
Shakspeare, ought never to be viewed apart from their contexts. 

Take from their environment a selection of passages from the works 
of any great author and they may appear gross; draw a picture from 
some incidents in any well-regulated domestic circle, and place it upon 
the stage of observation, with the brilliancy of lime-light effects to 
accentuate it, and it will be sport for the depraved and subject for 
unchaste thought. 

But the true dramatist, and the true historian, must see humanity as it 
is and reveal it ; not the beautiful and the true alone, but the repulsive 
and false also. 2 

One is shocked that a man of great literary ability and fame should 
have selected the grossest character of all Shakspeare's works, and 
identified the personal morality of the Poet with that character. Taine 

1 " The Great Poets and their Theology, p. 210. 

2 "The objection that Shakspeare wounds our feelings by the open display 
of the most disgusting moral odiousness, unmercifully harrows up the mind, 
and tortures even our eyes by the exhibition of the most insupportable and hate- 
ful spectacles, is one of the greater and graver importance. He has, in fact, never 
varnished over wild and blood-thirsty passions with a pleasing exterior — never 
clothed crime and want of principle with a false show of greatness of soul ; and 
in that respect he is every way deserving of praise. Twice he has portrayed 
downright villains, and the masterly way in which he has contrived to elude 
impressions of too painful a nature may be seen in Iago and Richard the Third. 
I allow that the reading, and still more the sight, of some of his pieces, is not 
advisable to weak nerves. . . . But if we wish to have a grand purpose, we 
must also wish to have the grand means, and our nerves ought in some measure 
to accommodate themselves to painful impressions, if, by way of requital, our mind 
is thereby elevated and strengthened." Dramatic Art and Literature, A. W. 
Schlegel. 



MORAL INCULCATIONS OF SHAKSPEARB 79 

says : "Falstaff has the passions of an animal and the imaginations of 
" a man of wit. There is no character which better exemplifies the fire 
" and immorality of Shakspeare. . . . This big fellow, a coward, a 
" cynic, a brawler, a drunkard, a lewd rascal, a pothouse poet is one of 
" Shakspeare's favorites. The reason is that his morals are not of fine 
" nature, and Shakspeare's mind is congenial with his own." 

It is true that Taine, a few pages further on in his review, has given 
a fuller and a less grotesque portrait of the Dramatist, but he does not 
remove this hideous caricature. The explanation seems to be that Taine 
is the product of that French school, which sees vice when clothed in 
ugliness or associated with clumsy or vulgar errors, but does not detect 
it when arrayed in purple, or regulated by social etiquette and police 
rule. It is refreshing to turn from this writer to another Frenchman of 
great eminence as an Author and a Statesman, — Lamartine, — who said : 
" It is as a moralist that Shakspeare excels ; no one can doubt this after 
" a careful study of his works, which, though containing some passages 
" of questionable taste, cannot fail to elevate the mind by the purity 
" of morals they inculcate. They breathe so strong a belief in virtue, 
" so steady an adherence to good principles, united to such a vigorous 
" tone of honor as testifies to the author's excellence as a moralist, nay, a 
" Christian." 

For the credit of the human race, we would that history could be his- 
tory without recording the horrible deeds of blood and lust which, in all 
ages, have occurred. We would that the Bible history of the Hebrew 
race were unstained with the sins of David, Solomon, Ahab and 
Rehoboam, and without the evils which debased the people. But if 
these things were omitted it would not be history, and the destruction 
of great cities, the ruin of kingdoms and the downfall of nations, would 
have been inexplicable enigmas. 

For the school text-book it is well that Hudson and others have modi- 
fied the text of Shakspeare to present everyday language and ethical 
ideas. Yet, who that values the power of a great master-work would 
destroy the poem which holds up to universal execration and everlasting 
condemnation the awful crime of Tarquin against the purity which is 
better than life, — the honor which is worth more than a diadem or a 
crown? And yet there are passages in that poem which, to separate 
them and accentuate them would be a crime against social morality. In 
regard to the language sometimes employed by the Poet, consideration 
must be allowed for the times in which he lived as well as the characters 
whom he portrayed. In his work, already quoted, Schlegel remarks: 



80 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

" Shakspeare, it is true, sometimes introduces us to improper company ; 
" at others, he suffers ambiguous expressions to escape in the presence 
" of women, and even from women themselves. This species of petu- 
" lance was probably not then unusual. He certainly did not indulge in 
" it merely to please the multitude, for in many of his pieces there is not 
" the slightest trace of this sort to be found : and in what virgin purity 
" are many of his female parts worked out ! When we see the liberties 
" taken by other dramatic poets in England in his time, and even much 
" later, we must account him comparatively chaste and moral." 1 

The characters of his dramas are true to life, not so much in local 
detail, but in the broader and universal survey. They are portraits of 
human nature — in all time — in all lands. They are not weakened by a 
shortened perspective nor distorted by an out-of-proportion foreground. 
Ruskin says of them : "They are perfect plays just because there is no 
" care about centuries in them, but a life which all men recognize for the 
" human life of all time ; and this it is, because, painting honestly and 
" completely from the men about him he painted that human nature 
" which is indeed constant enough, — a rogue in the fifteenth century 
" being at heart what a rogue is in the nineteenth, and was in the 
" twelfth ; and an honest or a knightly man being in like manner very 
" similar to other such at any other time. And the work of these great 
" idealists is therefore always universal ; not because it is not portrait 
" but because it is complete portrait which is the same in all ages." 2 

Carlyle has something to say akin to this: "Shakspeare is no secta- 
" rian : to all he deals with equity and mercy ; because he knows all and 
" his heart is wide enough for all. In his mind the world is a whole ; 
" he figures it as Providence governs it ; and to him it is not strange that 
" the sun should be called to shine on the evil and the good, and the 
" rain to fall on the just and the unjust." 3 

A much too common idea of Shakspeare is, that he had no unity of 
purpose or moral action in his plays, — that he wrote merely to harmonize 
his plot or dress it for the stage. But if it be that this was his sole or 
chief, conscious purpose, then it must be admitted that he was, uncon- 
sciously, a perfectly harmonious, moral teacher. In all his plays there is 
thrown a steady searchlight upon sin which shows it hideous. Sin is 
never exalted or deified. It is successful at times, and for a time, but it 
is inevitably attached to its nemesis. As Prof. Moulton says: "Shak- 
" speare is not satisfied with the easy morality which converts all its vil- 

1 Dramatic Art and Literature, A. W. Schlegel. 
'Modern Painters, Vol. Ill, p. 93. 
3 Essay on Goethe. 



MORAL INCULCATIONS OF SHAKSPEARE 81 

" lains before the fall of the curtain. In the play, as in actual fact, men 
" are seen divided into two classes : those in whom evil is only acci- 
" dental, to be purged out of them by the discipline of experience, and 
" those in whom the evil seems to be a part of their nature, and all the 
" working of events upon them serves only to drive it deeper in." 1 

That is to say, — Shakspeare makes sin to bring its own punishment. 
The Scriptural law, " Be sure your sins will find you out," is, with one 
exception, 2 always present in his plays. Retribution is conveyed in the 
very act of wrongdoing : "Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also 
reap." The force of the punishment is in the evil itself. 

So true to the Scriptual law is Shakspeare that he makes the sinful 
deeds of men to outline and determine the very nature of their punish- 
ment. Thus the action of conscience is seen working in the minds of 
the wrongdoer : — 

" So much my conscience whispers in your ear 
Which none but Heaven and you and I shall hear." 

King John i: I. 

" The colour of the King doth come and go 
Between his purpose and his conscience." 4: 2. 

Shakspeare shows conscience as an inward monitor which acts in us 
and for us. We depend upon it for our intuitions against wrong, as 
well as for our leanings towards right. The ship captain cannot do 
without his compass, for it is the conscience of the ship. As it turns to 
the north with certainty, so the human conscience turns towards the 
north pole of right and warns us against leading our craft wrong-wards. 
It is not a human contrivance, this conscience, but is divine, in its 
source, its aspiration and its law. 

Conscience is a terrible sourge to the wrongdoer. As the needle, 
pointing whither-ward, witnesses against the sailor who dares to ignore 
its warnings, so the human conscience is a whip of scorpions to the soul 
which heeds not its voice. 3 A brief perusal of the quotations in this 

Shakspeare as a Dramatic Artist, p. 278. 

2 See pp. 85,86 (Hen. VIII.). 

3 " Every sin comes back to plague the sinner. There is no need of any 
flagellations; every man flagellates himself. No God in heaven or devil in hell 
is needed to kindle the fire that is not quenched, or to breed the worm that 
dieth not. Every man kindles the fire and breeds the worm in his own soul. This 
is not new. The old Greek tragedians saw it, and wrought it into their tragedies. 
Dante saw it, and repeated it in the story of Inferno. Shakspeare saw it and 
6 



82 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

volume under the head of "Conscience" will show how perfectly and 
uniformly Shakspeare has presented this truth together with the unerr- 
ing law of justice and judgment. 

Falstaff" gloats over every new conquest of virtue in his licentious 
course ; he revels in merry lust and spends his wit and his means in the 
gratification of his abnormally gross nature, while public decency, order 
and law, or even the defeat of his plots, are all powerless to restrain him. 
Yet, in all his revelings, he is working out his own sure undoing ; by and 
by, he is deserted, even by his intimate associates in lewdness, and he 
dies in a house of ill-fame, mourned only by its immoral keeper. 

Macbeth and Richard III. each meet their own nemesis in horrible 
dreams and ghosts ; and a network of retribution is woven about them 
by their own hands until they die a bloody death amid the execrations 
of all. 

Iago, who is the incarnation of evil conspiracy, sowing discord and 
ruin until the whole circle of his friendships are driven to death or 
desperation, brings on his own ruin at the very climax of his successes, 
and his conviction is established by the witness and proclaimed by the 
moral indignation of his own wife, at the moment of his arrest and 
judgment : — 

" Though those that are betray'd 
Do feel the treason sharply, yet the traitor 
Stands in worse case of woe." Cymb. 5: 4. 

When Regan, daughter of King Lear, caps her cruelty by sharing in 
the monstrous act of putting out the eyes of Gloster because he has 
befriended her father, a servant who is looking on says : — 

" If she live long 
And, in the end, meet the old course of death 
Women will all turn monsters." King Lear 3: /. 

But Regan and Goneril, that pair of female monsters, do not "live 
long and meet the old course of death." They became madly jealous of 

revealed it in Macbeth and in Othello. Browning and Tennyson have seen and 
interpreted it." Evolution of Christianity. Lyman Abbott. 

"Shakspeare puts the demon and the angel, inside a man, where they belong. 
No longer is a human being lured on to a deed, which he seemingly cannot help, 
by some irresistible power outside of his own nature." The Shakspeare Drama, 
by Denton J. Snider. See also quotation on page 96 of this volume. 



MORAL INCULCATIONS OF SHAKSPEARB 83 

each other. Goneril poisons Regan, and then kills herself ; and when the 
double deed is reported to the reigning Duke, he says : — 

" This judgment of the heavens that makes us tremble 
Touches us not with pity." 5:3. 

Even the tragedy in the love drama of Romeo and Juliet, turns upon 
the law of nemesis. The Prince of Verona sums uo the tragical end of 
the play, with these words : — 

" Capulet ! Montague ! — 
See what a scourge is laid upon your hate, 
That Heaven finds means to kill your joys with love ! 
And I, for winking at your discords too 
Have lost a brace of kinsmen : — all are punished." 

Rom. and Jul. 5:3. 

Thus Shakspeare brings sin to judgment. And if Virtue appears, at 
times, not to see its reward in this life, yet, as an English divine has 
said : "As we read his works we feel that justice walks the world, delay- 
ing, it may be, but not forgetting ; as is ever the manner of the Divine." 1 

Witness also the moral inculcations of the Poet in all matters of sex 
relation. He draws the portrait of immoral characters as they are ; but 
he never places them in the light of commendation. As Coleridge says : 
"Shakspeare has no innocent adulteries, no virtuous vices; — he never 
renders that amiable which religion and reason alike teaches us to detest, 
or clothes impurity in the garb of virtue." 

His marriage doctrines are of the highest order of morality. 2 They 
are Scriptural — they are sacred, — they are ideal. His poetry on the sub- 
ject is conceived in the loftiest spirit ; it teaches the holiest and most per- 
fect blending of the two in one. When marriage is employed as a 
weapon or means of unholy passions or aims, it is shown to be prosti- 
tuted from its purpose and it brings forth the bitterest of fruits; the 
most powerful are shown to be swept, as by an avalanche, to ruin when 
they have violated its covenant or outraged its rites. 

Moreover, with Shakspeare, marriage is a religious ordinance and 
must be religiously observed, — not as a mere civil contract, but as "a 
world-without-end bargain" . . . "in the temple eternally knit." "God 
is the best maker of all marriages." 3 

1 Archbishop Trench. 

2 See chapter on Heroes and Heroines. 

3 See "Marriage," Scriptural Themes, etc., Book III. 



84 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

The Poet also shows that marriage is the very foundation institution 
of home-life, — the hope and security of society. In Measure tor 
Measure marriage is the redemption and salvation of social life; it 
solves the most difficult of problems. In other plays it unites king- 
doms and brings peace between warring factions and nations. 

It may be urged that Shakspeare represents old-fashioned views on 
this subject, leaning towards ideas of ownership rather than of partner- 
ship, and the supremacy of the man over the woman, as seen in the 
Taming oe the Shrew : — 

" Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper, 
Thy head, thy sovereign." 

Yet this is consistent with Paul's letters to the Ephesians and Colos- 
sians : — "Wives submit yourselves unto your own husbands, for the hus- 
band is the head of the wife." 

But it is with greater and more frequent emphasis that the Poet places 
woman in her true position of dignity and honor, as the help-meet and 
not the inferior of man. Portia, — Brutus's Portia, — is one of the 
noblest of Shakspeare's grand galaxy of noble women in the marital 
relation. Brutus had not realized the identity of heart and mind in the 
true man and wife. Portia's lofty appeal was a revelation to her hus- 
band. He thought her noble and beautiful, and a fit subject for his care, 
as he scolded her for risking her health to the inclement morning. But 
it was a new thought to him when she exclaimed : — 

"Within the bond of marriage, tell me, Brutus 
Is it excepted, I should know no secrets 
That appertain to you ? Am I yourself 
But, as it were, in sort, or limitation ; 
To keep with you at meals, comfort your bed, 
And talk to you sometimes ? Dwell I but in the suburbs 
Of your good pleasure ? If it be no more, 
Portia is Brutus' harlot, not his wife." Caesar 2: 2. 

What I No secrets from my wife — nothing that can separate our 
interests or disturb our peace ! Does it mean that these secrets that burn 
are to be shared by both of us, or otherwise, that Portia is wife only in 
part? It is thus that Shakspeare brings home to us the ultimatum 
of our mutual relation and so he holds "the mirror up to nature." 



MORAL INCULCATIONS OF SHAKSPEARB 85 

We have remarked that there is one exception, in the plays of Shak- 
speare, to the working out of the law of nemesis. 

Henry VIII. is the only one of the great dramas that does not bring 
the sins of the chief criminal to judgment. Here, the wicked is seen to 
thrive "like a green bay tree" and the judgment day does not come. 
Henry is crowned with success and the play closes upon him amidst a 
triumphant festival of joy and congratulation, while his victims suffer 
and die. This King is a confirmed sensual monster, — a full-fledged, pious, 
hypocrite, — he is a devil who "can cite Scripture for his own purpose" 
and, as Charles Dickens says : — "he is one of the most detestable villains 
that ever drew breath." Yet his most abominable plots succeed and the 
curtain is drawn upon his crowning happiness, while his patient and 
faithful wife (Katherine) lies dying of a broken heart. 

Critics have, of course, noticed this as inconsistent with the moral 
genius of Shakspeare and, to escape the dilemma, the authorship of the 
play has been questioned. Dr. Johnson accounts for its deficiencies, as 
for several other of the plays, by calling attention to the fact that the 
work is a composite, — other play-writers sharing in it for stage purposes 
and it seems to be generally conceded that the Prologue and Epilogue of 
this play were not by Shakspeare. Schlegel, the best German critic, 
places the play as unquestionably Shakspeare's and offers the best expla- 
nation for its main defect that we have seen. He points out that it was 
written during the reign of Elizabeth and that a full-length portrait of 
her father would not be possible at that time. Shakspeare could not 
present a play, for instance, during Elizabeth's reign that would dis- 
credit her legitimacy jmd therefore he had to frame it so as to leave 
Henry's marriage with Katherine in doubt as to legal form and legiti- 
macy. Yet, as Schlegel shows, the duplicity and hypocrisy of Henry are 
made easily apparent to the onlooker, while it is skilfully obscured from 
the view of Elizabeth by the brilliancy of his description of Cranmer's 
prophetic eulogy of herself at the christening. 

But there is another explanation of these apparent defects in the 
moral issue of the play which seems to have escaped notice ; at least, we 
have not seen it referred to in any published work. 

Henry VIII. was an uncompleted work. Everything points to the 
probability that this play was only part of a general plan of a larger 
work in the mind of Shakspeare, the completion of which would involve 
two, or three parts, as in the case of Henry IV. and Henry VI. 

Reasons for such an extension of the work are not far to seek. The 
play, as it is given to us, treats only of part of Henry's reign, although 



86 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

written long after his death and it closes at a point which would render 
it acceptable to the reigning authority of the time. Moreover it bears 
marks of leading up to further writing and it is reasonable to suppose 
that, had Shakspeare lived long enough to meet new conditions, he would 
have worked out the same moral order in this that he has done in all 
other of his historical plays. 

It may be added that there were ample materials ready at hand when- 
ever he might have assumed the task. The tragedies which attended 
the domestic infelicities of Henry, the failure of the King to find the 
happiness he sought in any one of his numerous wives, after his treach- 
ery to Katherine, the death which followed a disease which made him 
hideous to the sight and odious to the senses : — these and other things in 
the hands of Shakspeare would have amply served to illustrate his moral 
program. 

But the play is not without its chapter of judgment against sin. Cardi- 
nal Wolsey is the most prominent figure, next to the King, and in point 
of ability and ambition he is easily first. He is the most subtle and tal- 
ented of men in plotting for his own ends at the expense of others. One 
after another they are sent to the tower and executed, to make the way 
easier to Wolsey. But he overreaches himself and dies, — self-convicted, 
broken-down, dishonored, amid the execrations of his peers and the 
people and dies, in prison, deeply humiliated and penitent, while the 
executioner's axe hangs over his head waiting to fall upon him. 



V 



TRAGEDY IN THE BIBLE AND IN SHAKSPEARE 

Shakspeare turned instinctively to the Bible for types of sin, as well 
as of virtue. He saw the woeful anarchy in society, the ruin of domestic 
peace, the waste and destruction of wealth, the letting loose of the pas- 
sions of evil, — all represented in the first murder : — 

— " Let order die ! 
And let the world no longer be a stage 
To feed contention in a lingering act ; 
But let one spirit of the first-born Cain 
Reign in all bosoms, that each heart being set, 
On bloody courses, the rude scene may end, 
And darkness be the burier of the dead." 

// Hen. IV. i: i. 

This is one of eight separate references, in seven different plays, to 
Cain, or the murder of Abel. 

There is also a striking correspondence in the plots and characters of 
some of the tragedies of Shakspeare with some of those of the Bible. 
The most notable of these is the play of Macbeth. The Macbeth's are, in 
almost every detail, the very likeness of Ahab and Jezebel. Indeed one 
might easily suppose that the dramatist, while turning to Scotland for 
his location and names, had much more in his mind, the character and 
deeds of King Ahab and his wife ; "the very mind and being of the latter 
seem to be infused into, and to animate the former." Not only the gen- 
eral outline of the plot of the play, but also the spirit, and even the 
method of it, seem to be taken from the life of the wicked King and 
Queen of Israel. 

These analogies have not escaped notice. Further on we shall quote 
from a little work already referred to, which was published about fifty 
years ago. 1 

1 Shakspeare and the Bible. Rev. J. R. Eaton. 

87 



88 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

Mrs. Jameson calls attention to the first inception of the first great 
crime of the tragedy. She says: "We must bear in mind, that the 
" first idea of murdering Duncan is not suggested by Lady Macbeth 
" to her husband : it springs within his mind, and is revealed to us, 
" before his first interview with his wife, — before she is introduced or 
" even alluded to." 1 

So was it with Ahab. No mention is made of Jezebel in connection 
with Naboth's vineyard until Ahab coveted it. When Naboth refused 
to part with the property " Ahab came into his house heavy and dis- 
pleased . . . and laid him down upon his bed and turned away his 
face and would eat no bread." / Kings xxi. 4. 

And when the King told Jezebel the reason for his vexation, she 
promptly met him with this: "Dost thou now govern the Kingdom 
of Israel ? Arise and eat bread and let thy heart be merry : I will give 
thee the Vineyard of Naboth." xxi. 7. 

Jezebel's scheme was crafty and diabolical. In the King's name 
she proclaimed a fast and caused Naboth to be set in a prominent place 
among the people. Then, two men, sons of Belial, were hired to bear 
false witness against him, that he did "blaspheme God and the King." 
Thus Naboth was falsely convicted of a capital offense, in the pres- 
ence of the people, and officers were instructed to carry him out of the 
city and stone him to death. The confiscation of his property easily 
followed. Throughout the whole of the tragedy the hand and heart 
of Jezebel are clearly seen. 

As Ahab desired the vineyard of Naboth, so Macbeth coveted the 
crown of Scotland. But Duncan was King and his life was a barrier 
to Macbeth's ambition. And, as Jezebel learns the cause of Ahab's 
sulking, so Lady Macbeth is made aware of the trouble in the mind of 
Macbeth; — she reads a letter from him which speaks of the subject and 
in self-communing she says : — 

..." thou shalt be 

What thou art promis'd. Yet do I fear thy nature ; 

It is too full o' the milk of human kindness 

To catch the nearest way: . . . 

What thou would'st highly, 

That thou would'st holily: would'st not play false, 

And yet would'st wrongly win : — Hie thee hither, 

That I may pour my spirits in thine ear ; 

And chastise with the valour of my tongue 

All that impedes thee from the golden round." Mach 1:5. 

1 Characteristics of Women. Mrs. Jameson. 



TRAGEDY IN BIBLE AND IN SHAKSPEARE 89 

A little later, Macbeth enters and talks it over with his wife. Eager 
enough, in his wicked heart, to profit by her bolder spirit and "wrongly 
win :" — 

" Macb. Duncan comes here to-night. 
Lady M. And when goes hence? 
Macb. To-morrow as he proposes. 
Lady M. O never shall sun that morrow see 
. . . He that's coming 
Must be provided for ; and you shall put 
This night's great business into my dispatch." 1:5. 

Macbeth's craven heart seems to tremble at the thought of murder. 
His soliloquy shows him full of remorse and fear before the deed is 
done; but his wife has already said: 

" Only look up clear ; 
To alter favour is to fear : 
Leave the rest to me." 1:5. 

Still he hesitates. In the dead hour of the night, he and his guilty 
partner discuss the situation; anxiously he says: "// we should fail?" 
and she answers promptly: — 

" We fail. 
But screw your courage to the sticking-place, 
And we'll not fail." 1:7. 

Thus, Lady Macbeth, like Jezebel, urges on the deed of guilt, and 
makes the occasion and the plot. She provides that the King's two per- 
sonal attendants shall be plied with liquor until they fall into a drunken 
sleep and that, when the deed is done, suspicion shall be turned towards 
them, by throwing blood from the wounds of the murdered King upon 
their garments. 

Jezebel and Lady Macbeth each succeed in their respective guilty 
purpose. Ahab secures Naboth's vineyard, after the treacherous mur- 
der of its owner, and Macbeth obtains the crown of Scotland, — after: 
"the deep damnation of his (Duncan's) taking off." 

And nemesis follows similarly, in each of the two tragedies. It was 
prophesied of Ahab and Jezebel : "In the place where dogs licked the 
blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood. . . . The dogs shall eat 
Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel." / Kings xxi. 19, 23. 



90 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPBARB 

Both these prophecies were fulfilled. Ahab was betrayed in battle 
and was killed in his chariot, and his blood, that was spilled upon his 
chariot, was licked by the dogs. Jezebel came to a fearful and igno- 
minious death, — being hurled from a chamber window while insanely 
displaying her painted charms to the conquering army, as they passed 
in procession, and her body was torn to pieces by dogs before the order 
for her burial was obeyed. 

What of Macbeth? His guilty heart no longer leans upon the 
superior courage of his wife. She shrinks from further blood, but he 
plunges on with sanguinary voracity, from crime to crime. He sheds 
blood on blood, and — blood is on his trail. All through his career, as 
King, he is tortured with the anguish of bitter remorse: — 

" They say, blood will have blood, 
Stones have been known to speak, 
Augurs and understood relations have . . . 
Brought forth . . . The secret'st man of blood." 2: 2. 

And so it comes to pass. His damnable deeds bring judgment. Like 
Ahab he comes to his end by a special mark directed against him in 
battle, but not before he has suffered the terrors of a guilty conscience. 
The horrors of hell are in him, and his brain is peopled with demons 
and ghosts as he cries: — 

" Ha ! they pluck out mine eyes ! 
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
Clean from my hand ? No ; this my hand will rather 
The multitudinous seas incarnadine 
Making the green — one red." 2: 2. 

And Lady Macbeth's conscience-stricken soul finds no peace, day or 
night. She walks her room in troubled sleep and groans over her 
hand, whose deep, dark, blood-stain is seen only by the eyes of her own 
guilty soul : — 

" What, will these hands ne'er be clean ? . . . 
. . . Here's the smell of blood still : all the perfumes 
Of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh ! Oh ! Oh !" 

5-2. 

Thus their bloody deeds are on the trail of the guilty pair, as those 
of Ahab and Jezebel pursued them. The Lady Macbeth lives her 



TRAGEDY IN BIBLE AND IN SHAKSPEARE 91 

crime over again many times, until her reason topples from its throne 
and she dies self-convicted, self-condemned, self-slaughtered, — mad. 

Prof. Moulton, like Mrs. Jameson, sees some good points in the 
Lady Macbeth such as "an absence of self-seeking," a constant 
thought, — "not of what she is to gain by the crown but what her hus- 
band may gain." But since she identifies herself with her husband's 
ambition and their interests are not separate, but one, it seems difficult 
to find a distinction in her favor, so far, at least, as the capital crime 
of Duncan's murder is concerned. If, however, any virtue is con- 
ceded her it must also be accredited to Jezebel, since she sought the 
vineyard of Naboth in order to gratify the covetous whim of Ahab. 

Dr. Stafford, the eminent Catholic lecturer, sees good in Macbeth 
and only evil in his wife. His masterly dramatic exhibition shows 
Macbeth in a great struggle against the temptation to evil and a yield- 
ing only through the force of Lady Macbeth's influence and then, step 
by step, led on by the demands which one evil deed makes upon him 
for another, until he is completely and irredeemably environed and 
overwhelmed. 1 

These opposite views of his greater characters, which will be found 
to vary, from one extreme to the other, in the reviews of critics, are 
among the evidences of the subtlety of Shakspeare's work. 

The following passage from Modern Painters by John Ruskin is 
pertinent at this point : — 

"Shakspeare always leans on the force of fate, as it urges the final evil : 
and dwells with infinite bitterness on the power of the wicked, and the infinitude 
of results dependent seemingly on little things. A fool brings the last piece 
of news from Verona and the dearest lives of its noble houses are lost : they might 
have been saved if the Sacristan had not stumbled as he walked. Othello mislays 
his handkerchief, and there remains nothing for him but death. Hamlet gets hold 
of the wrong foil, and the rest is silence. Edmund's runner is a moment too 
late at the prison, and the feather will not move at Cordelia's lips. Salisbury a 
moment too late at the tower, and Arthur lies on the stones dead. Goneril 
and Iago have, on the whole, in this world, Shakspeare sees, much of their 
own way, though they come to a bad end. It is a pin that Death pierces the 
King's fortress wall with ; and carelessness and folly sit, sceptered and dread- 
ful, side by side with the pin-armed skeleton." 

*As a further illustration of the various opinions on this subject we have this 
from Prof. Sharp : — "Macbeth is a man without real scruples although faint 
images of restraining voices sometimes chime upon his inner ear. What moral 
sensitiveness he possesses is only sufficient to enable him to enjoy coddling him- 
self for his regret at his unfortunate conduct, to make of him a sentimentalizing 
dealer in fine phrases." Of Lady Macbeth he says she "is as bare of moral 
scruples as her husband." " Shakspeare's Portrayal of the Moral Life." Frank 
Chapman Sharp. 



9 2 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

Commenting upon this summary of certain characteristics of Shak- 
speare, a writer already referred to, has shown that "if it be thus in 
Shakspeare and in the world" it is so also in the Bible. He says : — 

" Jezebel and Judas have it all their own way, though they come to a bad end. 
In that sacred book, from beginning to end, good men lament that the wicked 
' flourish ' here, ' like a green bay-tree.' That ' they come not into peril like 
other folk, neither are in trouble like other men.' David could not understand 
this till he 'went into the house of God and understood the end of these men.' 
Granting a superintending providence, which Shakspeare ever recognizes, things 
come to pass in the Bible, and in the world, as by chance. ' The lot is cast into 
the lap but the disposal is with the Lord.' 

" The most solemn predictions in Scripture, are fulfilled seemingly by accident. 
In the Bible, if anywhere, we might be led to expect the gradual development of 
a plot or principle; whereas we meet the very reverse of this. It was foretold 
that Ahab should not return in peace. He accordingly perished in battle. But 
how does he perish? 'A certain man draws a bow at a venture, and pierces the 
King between the joints of his harness.' It was also predicted that ' dogs should 
lick his blood.' How is this prophecy fulfilled? Is the body exposed to purposed 
indignity? No, it was buried, we have reason to believe, with respect. But 
' one washed the chariot in the pool of Samaria ; ' and then the ' dogs came and 
licked, up the blood,' in the usual course of events. 

" Jehu, indeed, affected to fulfill the prediction concerning Joram, by casting 
his body into the plot of Naboth, the Jezreelite. But Jehu forgot, and would 
have left unfulfilled, what had been foretold in the case of Jezebel. He gave 
orders to bury this ' cursed woman,' because ' she was a king's daughter.' But he 
first went in to eat and drink. Before he had finished his meal, the dogs had 
had theirs ; and then he remembered the word which the Lord had spoken by the 
mouth of Elijah the Tishbite. 

" Since, then, what we call accident seems to be the ruling power, where 
divine interposition is clearly exerted (if we allow it ever to be exerted at all), 
it follows that Shakspeare, in representing the lives of the greatest and best of 
human beings as the sport of chance, does literally follow the order of God and 
nature. He is bitter, and we are bitter at this state of things, because we find it 
hard to realize the truth, that it is neither a man's worldly fortunes, nor the 
adherence of his friends, nor the fidelity of his wife, nor the time, nor the manner 
of his death, but the tenor of his life, which determines whether he be properly 
an object of envy or pity. Humanly speaking, what is there more horrible, or 
more unjust in Shakspeare, than that a good man, after a life of mortification and 
obedience to his Maker's will, should be secretly murdered in a dungeon at the 
pleasure of a light dancer? The wicked 'have done to him what they listed!' 
Had this been narrated merely in a novel or a play, the author's morality had 
doubtless been questioned, and he had been accused of setting an injurious 
example. All other means failing, better have introduced an angel to burst the 
prison door, than that this should have been. But God teaches otherwise." 1 

1 Shakspeare and the Bible. By Rev. T. R. Eaton, M. A., 1857. 



TRAGEDY IN BIBLE AND IN SHAKSPEARE 93 

If we follow Ruskin and Mr. Eaton in these thoughts we may easily 
add other illustrations. We think of Stephen stoned at the very spring- 
time of his manhood while his murderers live and are, for a time, 
approved and rewarded ; of Paul, in prison while Nero is on the 
throne; of John in banishment, while the wicked revel in power and 
splendor and many others of the noble army of martyrs and reformers. 

The reference to John the Baptist suggests another tragedy in which 
a woman was a chief factor and which may have been in the mind of 
Shakspeare when he wrote Macbeth. It was Herodias who plotted the 
death of John. Herod was vile enough to have murdered the Baptist 
for his own gratification but he did not dare to do it. His wife, how- 
ever, conceived the hideous plot which culminated in one of the most 
ghastly murders, even of that sanguinary age. 

In another chapter we remark on the similar conception of woman in 
the Bible and in Shakspeare. Miriam, Deborah, Ruth, Dorcas, Mar- 
tha and the Marys are sublimely beautiful characters. But Jezebel and 
Herodias are fiends incarnate. Shakspeare's heroines are faultless and 
his two or three wicked women are desperately and irredeemably evil. 



"In the four grand tragedies (Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, Lear), the central 
problem is a profoundly moral one. It is the supreme internal conflict of good 
and evil amongst the central forces and higher elements of human nature, as 
appealed to and developed by sudden and powerful temptation, smitten by accumu- 
lated wrongs, or plunged in overwhelming calamities. As the result, we learn 
that there is something infinitely more precious in life than social ease or worldly 
success — nobleness of soul, fidelity to truth and honor, human love and loyalty, 
strength and tenderness, and truth to the very end. In the most tragic experiences 
this fidelity to all that is best in life is only possible through the loss of life itself. 
But when Desdemona expires with a sigh and Cordelia's loving eyes are closed, 
when Hamlet no more draws his breath in pain and the tempest-tossed Lear is at 
last liberated from the rack of this tough world, we feel that, death having set his 
sacred seal on their great sorrows and greater love, they remain with us as 
possessions forever. In the three dramas belonging to Shakspeare's last period, 
or rather which may be said to close his dramatic career, the same feeling of 
severe but consolatory calm is still more apparent. If the deeper discords of life 
are not finally resolved, the virtues which soothe their perplexities and give us 
courage and endurance to wait, as well as confidence to trust the final issues,— 
the virtues of forgiveness and generosity, of forbearance and self-control — are 
largely illustrated. Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. 21, p. 764. 



VI 

RELIGIOUS THOUGHT IN THE PLOTS OF THE PLAYS 

It seems desirable to add some further comments to the thought of 
the religious idea which enters into the plots of the plays of Shak- 
speare. Not that (as we have elsewhere remarked), he ever made 
religion the subject of the drama. But all humanity was his theme and 
he recognized the universality of religion in man and gave expression 
to it in all his works. 

It is true that in some of the plays the religious element is primitive 
and crude. But the scene and action of these plays are pagan ; yet even 
here worship is conceived as a natural order and the gods, who are 
appealed to with devotion and reverence, are clothed with moral attrib- 
utes. It cannot be, in any true sense, said of Coriolanus, Titus Andron- 
icus, Timon of Athens, Troilus and Cressida, Cymbeline or Antony 
and Cleopatra that they are atheist or infidel, in regard to religion. 
There are occasional skeptical utterances, and at least one positive 
atheist: — Aaron the Moor, — whose portrait is drawn in the play of 
Titus Andronicus, in characters blacker than his skin. 

Shakspeare never conceived an infidel of amiable, or even decent 
character. Aaron, who "believed no God," was a monster of iniquity, 
a brutal, cruel, demon of a man, without a spark of goodness, who 
boasted that: "Aaron will have his soul black like his face." His deeds 
and curses were of the foulest; he found sport in the vilest outrages, 
on man and woman, and exclaimed : — 

" If there be devils would I were a devil 
To live and burn in everlasting fire, 
So I might have your company in hell, 
But to torment you with my bitter tongue." 

Titus And. 5: 1. 

Coleridge has well said, 1 "I know of no character in Shakspeare to 
which he has given a propensity to sneer and scoff or express contempt 
but he has made that man a villain." 

lectures on Shakspeare. 

94 



RELIGIOUS THOUGHT IN PLOTS OF PLAYS 95 

Even in the minor plays we find a constant movement toward retri- 
bution and judgment, and the working out of all things towards the 
good of society. The sacrifices of the virtuous, the sufferings of the 
good who are sometimes involved in the evil plots of the bad, and the 
final ignominy and death of the wicked always lead to better things. 

Take, for example, the play already alluded to and what do we find ? 
At the outset Titus commits a serious error in conceding the preten- 
sions to the throne of the unworthy Saturninus. A still graver wrong 
is his yielding to the clamor for one of the Goths as a sacrifice of con- 
quest, — giving up to slaughter the eldest son of the conquered queen. 
There follows a general disorder. The country is humiliated and dis- 
graced by its Emperor's consort with the base and lustful Queen 
Lavinia; the fair daughter of Titus is cruelly outraged and butchered 
and Titus himself is victimized with the loss of a hand. Revenge upon 
the brutal sons of the Queen is conceived in a savage mood and man- 
ner of death; King, Queen and Titus are each involved in the final 
tragedy. Yet all the movement of the play leads toward a purging of 
the country from the spirit which led up to these crimes, and brings 
about a new and happier condition, under the rule of the experienced 
and chastened Lucius. 

It is in the major plays, however, that we find the religious thought 
rising higher and is, in fact, reverent, Scriptural and Christian. 

It has been said that the works of Shakspeare are "the logical and 
fitting sequence of the old mystery play." Mr. Snider says, "this seeks 
" to give in a religious framework, the entire history of man from the 
" Creation till the Judgment Day, as it is presented in historic con- 
" tinuity in the Old and New Testaments. The Lord and the Devil 
" are the two chief characters, who appear, in person, on the stage and 
" carry on the conflict. The Devil is comic in these old plays, so are all 
" his demons, cohorts and earthly representatives such as Herod. To 
" the simple mind of the people, the bad, in attempting to overthrow 
" the good is foolish, ludicrous, comic. Evil in its complete circle is 
" self-destructive, so our ancestors laughed at the Devil, on the stage 
" at least. . . . The true drama must have all these elements, — it must 
" reveal the divine way of dealing with the world as the mystery play ; 
" it must show the moral germ in the individual as the morality play ; 
" it must be life incorporate, as the interlude. Now Shakspeare has all 
" these elements, not in isolation, but so fused together in the heat of 
" his poetic conception, that they make something altogether new. His 
" drama is not strictly religious, not strictly moral, not strictly sen- 



96 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPBARB 

" suous, yet it is all three ; it shows the world order, it portrays per- 
" sonal character in the deepest sense." 1 

But it must be observed that the difference between Shakspeare and 
the old religious play-writers is, that he does not use any "religious 
framework" to set forth religion and he never places the Divine Being, 
in person on the stage, or presents a spectacular heaven or hell. 2 The 
world is his stage and all mankind are his characters. He makes 
these to move in a consistent and uniform ethical order, in perfect har- 
mony with Scriptual teaching. In fact, as Mr. Snider says, "It is 
herein that the unique and all surpassing greatness of Shakspeare lies." 

Mr. Snider has also shown, most clearly, in his treatment of the 
Tragedies and the Comedies, how Shakspeare brought "all colliding 
elements into harmony. The solution of all disturbing and conflicting 
agents" has one fundamental principle — the return of the deed upon 
the doer. Man has that which he has done brought home to him in 
the end ; his action, often through the most devious and subtle passages, 
sweeps back and includes himself. Eternal, divine justice it may be 
called, indeed it is found already named in some of these plays, — 'jus- 
tice of God.' . . . Tragedy with him means, not death merely, but 
sacrifice. Shakspeare's tragedy is at the bottom, mediatorial and 
reaches into the divine scheme of the world." 3 

This view of the Tragedies presents to many readers, a new lesson, 
of the greatest breadth and value. It furnishes a key to many of the 
most difficult passages and explains why the Poet has introduced some 
characters into his plays which are otherwise inexplicable. 

We have seen, how the love of Romeo and Juliet becomes the force 
which leads to the sacrifice, not only of the lovers themselves, but of 
all who stand in the way of peace between the warring houses of 
Capulet and Montague. 

We see also how Hamlet's death is involved in the death of his 
father's murderer, for he, too, had killed a father; and how Ophelia 
is sacrificed through love, and her father and brother are also involved 
in the tragedy, which, however, brings about a condition of general 
peace, impossible or incomplete while any of them lived. 

Richard III., in his violence and crusade of murder, is an instrument 
of retribution, completing the fall of the houses of Lancaster and York 
which had kept England in a broil for a long period of years; and 
brought about the first crowning of an English King by parliamentary 

*The Shakspeare Drama. Introduction to Tragedies. 
a See chapter on Shakespeare and Immortality. 
3 The Shakspeare Drama (Tragedies). 



RELIGIOUS THOUGHT IN PLOTS OF PLAYS 97 

title, introducing a new era of government and peace to England; 
while Richard comes to his death in a manner exactly fitted to his fear- 
ful and murderous life. 

The representation of Richard III. as a skeptic is surely foreign to 
the text of the play as we have it. He was impious and blasphemous 
but he evidently believed in the fundamental teachings of his church. 
At times he would scoff at retribution and he tried to laugh away his 
fears with — "conscience is a word that cowards use," yet at another 
time this very thought turns upon him. As he awakes from a troubled 
dream he exclaims, "O coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me !" 
His dreams are the foreshadowings of the realities of to-morrow's judg- 
ment. He is in terror, not of any earthly tribunal or of physical fear, 
for he is no coward. The awful conflict is within and his fears do not 
proceed from skeptical doubts but the very reverse. In his soliloquy 
he portrays his terror : — 

" Cold fearful drops stand on my trembling flesh. 
Is there a murderer here ? No ; — Yes ; I am : 
Then fly, — what, from myself ? Great reason : why ? 
My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, 
And every tongue brings in a several tale 
And every tale condemns me for a villain: 
Methought, the souls of all that I had murder'd 
Came to my tent : and every one did threat 
To-morrow's vengeance on the head of Richard." 5:5. 

Nor can he shake off this guilty fear in the presence of others. He 
confesses to Ratcliff : — 

" By the apostle Paul, shadows to-night 
Have struck more terror to the soul of Richard, 
Than can the substance of ten thousand soldiers 
Armed in proof, and led by Richmond." 5:5. 

He describes his own deeds of wickedness, not as a skeptic would, 
but as one who believes in the terms of the Bible : — 

" I am in 
So far in blood that sin will pluck on sin." 



98 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPBARB 

And while Richard does not, like Richmond, take any pious comfort 
from the thought that God supports him in his battles (indeed, how 
could he?) yet he recognizes the hand of Heaven in the conflict: — 

" — the self-same heaven 
That frowns on me looks sadly upon him." 

One thing in this play does not seem to be consistent with Shak- 
speare. Lady Anne is represented as yielding to the strangely fasci- 
nating tongue of Richard under circumstances that are unnatural and 
revolting and especially so, to such a woman. We are inclined there- 
fore to believe that this scene has been interpolated for stage effect and 
note with satisfaction Coleridge's opinion that "Shakspeare did not 
write the scene." 

Turning to the play of Macbeth we have already noticed the strik- 
ing analogy in the plot with the Bible account of Ahab and Jezebel. 1 
Macbeth is troubled with a keen conscience, but it does not stay his 
hand. He beats down the accusing agent by reasoning: — 

" I am in blood 
Stepp'd in so far, that, should I wade no more; 
Returning were as tedious as go o'er." 

And so he plunges on, deeper and deeper in blood, sacrificing all who 
stand in his way. He is "hell bound," as Macduff says, and not until 
the end of the tragedy, with all that are involved, is there a way for 
peace and better government, by the nobler Malcolm. 

The play of Othello opens to view another of those tangled webs, 
which are woven by error and wrong, and which Shakspeare so admir- 
ably shows are unraveled only by the order of the ethical law and divine 
justice. Othello is at the head of the army, distinguished above the 
noblest citizen of Venice. His bravery in war has placed him there, but 
it has also turned the heads of the governing powers and won the love 
of the beautiful daughter of a Senator, who marries him in spite of her 
father's opposition. 

This is a great error, — a crime against the order of nature and the 
proprieties of civilized society. Desdemona shares fully in this viola- 
tion of order and does wrong to her father and to society, by eloping 
and marrying the Moor. This marriage is neither natural or moral. 

1 See chapter on "Tragedies in Bible and in Shakspeare." 



RELIGIOUS THOUGHT IN PLOTS OF PLAYS 



99 



All the heroic qualities of Othello do not justify the mesalliance. It is 
in the nature of things that trouble and discord will follow. The eth- 
ical law cannot be appeased until the breach is healed. Sacrifice and 
judgment are inevitable. And in this case they follow quickly: the 
sins, already committed, have a speedy progeny. 

The death of Desdemona is shocking to our view and commands our 
sympathy. It does not seem that she has done anything to call for so 
violent an ending. Yet she wedded herself to the Moor, and he, for 
whom she sacrificed race instincts, degraded herself socially, and dis- 
obeyed her father's will, takes her life. 

The villain Iago meets the conviction and death of ignominy con- 
sistent with his treacherous crimes, while Othello inflicts his own pun- 
ishment in a fit of noble passion and sorrow, mingled with contempt 
for himself, as a fool who was entrapped in the meshes of a traitor 
and conspirator. The play, as a whole, is a striking illustration of 
Shakspeare's consistent working out, through all the various stages of 
his works, towards the final sacrifice that must ever attend the breach 
of the ethical order of the world. 1 

The great historical plays of English Kings, are, with one excep- 
tion, 2 infused with the same principles. Indeed, it is in the plays of the 
Henry's and the Richard's that we find most of Scripture and the relig- 
ious institutions : — the church, the saint days, the holy days, the clergy 
and the prayer-book are, all of them, in frequent evidence. No brief 
reference to these various plays could even introduce the many religious 
themes that are found there. 3 

And, to a very large extent the same may be said of the greater 
Comedies. 

The Merchant of Venice is a drama of mediation. Mercy is its 
plea and Portia is its charming voice. Mr. Snider has furnished us 
with an excellent commentary on this play from which we desire to 
quote the following interesting paragraph : "Many lawyers say that no 
" court in Christendom would have decided that a pound of flesh did 
" not include the blood, though the bond might not have expressly said 
" so. This may be the case but it does not affect the truth of Shak- 
" speare's representation. His design was to show how formal law con- 
" tradicts itself and to exhibit the Jew beaten at his own game. The 
" might of the form of law was never more powerfully represented. 
" The Judge, the people and justice itself, are all on the side of the 

1 See appended Note on Othello at foot of this article. 

'See Henry VIII in chapter 4. 

* The quotations from these plays will be found in Book IV of this volume. 

t'L.ofC. 



ioo RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

" innocent man, yet they are unable to rescue him from the clutches 
" of an odious wretch who has the form alone on his side. Still the 
" Poet must find for us some reconciliation with the law : it would be 
" most ridiculously inadequate if it did not furnish some means for 
" reaching the Jew. This it does, inasmuch as it is made to seize the 
" crime of Shylock just at its most vulnerable point, — criminal inten- 
" tion. This is Portia's next point against him. He has willed the 
" death of a citizen of which the punishment is confiscation and death." 1 

So Shakspeare does not bring Antonio to death. Shylock himself 
must be the sacrifice; — in the end his wealth is confiscated, and his 
credit ruined ; yet Mercy steps in and saves his life, although he him- 
self had no mercy. 

Measure For Measure is still more clearly a play of mediatorship. 
Isabella is mediator for her brother's sin and at the same time the 
accuser of the sinful Deputy. Here, as in the Merchant of Venice, 
mercy rises above law. But the chief purpose in the play is to bring 
about a better observance of family honor and personal chastity. The 
public conscience is weak; the general conduct is loose and the family 
is in danger. Mediation and sacrifice redeem society and family life 
finds an example in the marriage of the Duke and Isabella. 2 

These comments may be said to refer to the ethical principles of the 
Poet, but it will be seen that his ethics are profoundly religious and 
imbued with Scripture reference and thought. It would require a vol- 
ume by itself to do justice to this theme. But, in truth, we can never 
do it justice. Shakspeare must be his own interpreter. He who would 
understand the Poet's loftiest teachings must study him. 



[Note.] Mr. Denton J. Snider has presented a view of Othello 
which seems to us at variance with his own conception and treatment 
of Shakspeare's consistency and harmony with the moral law. He 
says : "The true motive for Iago's hate" lies in this : "He considers 
that Othello has destroyed the chastity of his wife." 

This suggestion is based upon two of the soliloquies of Iago, in the 
first of which he tells himself that such a thing "is thought abroad," to 
which he adds: — 

^he Shakspeare Drama (Comedies). 
1 See chapter 3, Heroes and Heroines. 



RELIGIOUS THOUGHT IN PLOTS OF PLAYS 101 

" I know not if't be true 
But I, for mere suspicion in that kind 
Will do, as for surety." 

This is his speech after his second interview of conspiracy with 
Roderigo. It is true that in his next soliloquy Iago recurs to the same 
thought and lays more stress upon it; but one looks, in vain, for the 
grounds of his suspicion or for evidence that he either knows or 
believes it. His soliloquies are rehearsals of the part he means to play 
in his deeds of "double knavery." Standing alone, they amount to 
nothing as evidence against Othello. They are vivid pictures of the 
inner workings of the mind of Iago and they reveal his attempts to 
reason himself into excuses for his devilish deeds which may afford 
some salve to his own conscience. For even Iago has a conscience. 

But Mr. Snider accepts Iago's counterfeits as current coin, and 
assuming the guilt of Othello, he says: "Here lies the germ of his 
belief in the faithlessness of his wife." If this were true, Othello 
would be the first offender and Iago would have the excuse of an 
aggrieved and wronged husband. Furthermore, if this were true, Jus- 
tice was unequal, which is precisely what Mr. Snider claims never hap- 
pens in Shakspeare. Othello died by his own hand, repentant and self- 
condemning for his part in the tragedy, but lamented as a hero, without 
a stain upon his reputation ; while Iago was delivered up to the execu- 
tioner, amid the execrations of all, as "a hellish villain," who had 
wrought evil for good and for whose punishment the extreme penalty 
of the law was inadequate. 

It does not escape Mr. Snider's observation that Iago never mentions 
the subject of his suspicion, but he argues that "he would not be likely 
to announce his own shame, or herald his self-degrading suspicions." 

But what cared he for the shame of it? He, who plundered the 
weak libertine (Roderigo) of his money, on the pretense of securing 
the ruin of Desdemona to serve his lust ; — he, whose opinion of women 
was mean and vile and who had but little respect for and no faith in 
his wife? Would such a man hesitate to tell his story to Roderigo, 
when relating to him the reasons for his hate, if he had really believed 
it? Would he not have poured a story in the ears of Desdemona's 
father which at least implied that he had reasons to suspect Othello ? 

What is still more to the point : — Had Othello been guilty with the 
wife of Iago, would he have selected her as the attendant and com- 
panion of his young bride upon whose lovely innocence he doted, while 
he went to the war? 



102 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

Can one imagine a man like Iago being silent when confronted by 
Othello in the presence of the officers of the law with this : — 

" Will you I pray demand that demi-devil 
Why he hath ensnar'd my soul and body?" 

Had he possessed any reasons for suspicion, Iago would most assur- 
edly have answered this challenge. Nothing that we can conceive of, 
would have wrought so much in his favor as a plea of partial justifica- 
tion such as this would have been. 1 

And then, does Othello himself, in his last moments, exhibit any 
trace of self-conviction? In the presence of the same officers, and of 
Iago and his wife Emilia, he says : — 

" Speak of me as I am : nothing extenuate, 
Nor set down aught in malice : then you must speak 
Of one that loved not wisely, but too well." 

One has not far to seek for the real cause of Iago's hate. Othello 
appointed Cassio instead of himself to the coveted lieutenancy. It is a 
case of disappointed ambition and he is bent on revenge. "I do hate 
him," he tells Brabantio, " as I do hell-pains." He knows well that no 
ordinary means will accomplish the downfall of a man like Othello. 
His plot, therefore, is conceived, with all circumstance and detail, so 
as to arouse jealousy in the one thing that would touch the Moor to 
the quick. This he does with masterly skill and cunning, making 
Roderigo, Cassio, and his own wife, all instruments of his devilish plot 
until he sets on fire : — 

" One, not easily jealous, but, being wrought, 
Perplexed to the extreme; . . . threw away a pearl." 

1 Prof. Sharp regards Iago as conscienceless. " He desires Roderigo's money, 
Cassio's place, possibly, too, the satisfaction of avenging himself upon Othello for 
prefering a book-crammed student to a man of affairs like himself, and for being 
the (innocent) occasion of false reports about his wife's unfidelity. . . . He 
finds an actual enjoyment in his villainy, not primarily because he wants revenge, 
but because he delights in his sense of strength and skill that is awakened by 
successful intrigue. He chuckles over his disguise and plays with it; he becomes 
so fascinated with the game that he half forgets the ends for which it was 
originally undertaken and we hear about his marital jealousy of the Moor 'gnaw- 
ing his inwards,' and even of a similar jealousy of Cassio. "Shakespeare's Por- 
traval of a Moral Life." 



VII 

SHAKSPBARB AND IMMORTALITY 

It has been said that "Christianity has failed to express itself in any 
adequate drama." 1 But this may be simply an acknowledgment that 
the drama is inadequate to express it. The greatest things of the 
Christian religion are inexpressible. The drama deals with visible 
things; it can only represent the unseen in so far as material things 
can embody it. But, as the Apostle Paul says : " The things which 
are seen are temporal ; but the things which are not seen are eternal." 

It has also been said that "for Shakspeare, in the matter of religion, 
the choice lay between Christianity and nothing." 1 If it be meant, that 
for purposes of dramatization he made choice of 'nothing' in religion, 
then we agree with the writer and the absence of any great religious 
drama by Shakspeare is explained. A religion which consists of tem- 
ples, cathedrals, robes, ritual, forms, sacrificial offerings and proces- 
sions, may be dramatized; but to Shakspeare, Christianity was inex- 
pressibly greater. Even his genius could not reach the unseen things 
which are spiritual, and embody them as creatures of nature and of 
sense. 

All attempts at the dramatization of Heaven and Hell are necessarily 
grotesque, and are infinitely below the real and true. Heaven can only 
be seen by the heavenly character. Hell is unreal to the speculative 
thinker, but terribly real to the conscience of the wicked doer. 

Immortality is not a subject for the drama. Art cannot paint it ; 
poetry cannot attain unto it; genius cannot discover it; — the best that 
they can do is to portray expressions of the human in whose soul 
immortality is an abiding hope. 

It has often been said that the greatest of all dramatists had no soul 
for the immortal, because he did not, like Homer, Virgil, Dante, Mil- 
ton, and Goethe, enter the realm of an imaginary heaven or hell. Even 
Dr. Strong dwells upon this thought as a limitation in Shakspeare. He 
says, almost mournfully, "Shakspeare has no heaven and no hell," 2 and 

X G. Santayana in The New World, Dec, 1896. 
3 The Great Poets and their Theology. 

103 



104 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

quotes Scherer, 1 as saying: "It is on the boundaries of the invisible 
world that Shakspeare's vision fails." 

But it seems to us that, in nothing is the universal quality of Shak- 
speare's genius seen more clearly, than in the fact that he presented 
the Eternal through human experience, in its infinite variety of hopes 
and fears, the working of conscience, the basis of ethical thought, and 
the common looking forward of all men towards judgment and a here- 
after. He was too fully and truly the poet of the world's realities to 
attempt a picture of the divine, or build a drama upon the immortality 
of man. He did not essay to gild the stars or illuminate the sun. 

But he was also, too great and too true, to the highest thought and 
aspiration of the human mind to ignore its loftiest conceptions and 
hopes. Essentially, he treats the subject of immortality as the Bible 
does. The Scriptures proceed upon the assumption that Immortality is. 
They do not, in any definite form, announce it, or affirm it. From Gen- 
esis to Revelation there is no defining word, — no special statement 
of it. The fact of the after-life is not declared, but taken for granted. 
It is whispered in every promise to dying man; it is assumed in the 
doctrine of salvation; it is involved in the resurrection, in the final 
adjustment, in the law of rewards and punishment, in justice and judg- 
ment, in Heaven and Hell. In all Christ's teachings he never refers 
to the future life as a subject in doubt, or needing to be affirmed. He 
taught its conditions, — the fact he assumed. When the Apostle Paul 
says, "this mortal must put on immortality," — the theme of his dis- 
course is, life, death and the resurrection: — immortality is a logical 
sequence. 

So also, Shakspeare does not make the spiritual realm a subject of 
the drama. There are no spectacular heaven or hell in his plays. He 
seems to have recognized that the realities of the spiritual world are 
not for the stage, — that immortality can only be declared in the faith 
and the hopes of human experience. It is true that some of the numer- 
ous personnel of his plays express doubts about the after-life; but in 
such cases, the character or circumstances of the doubter, point to it 
as a generally recognized fact, and our Poet never puts into the lips 
of any sane or credible witness any doubt on the subject. The doubter 
is either a pagan or a dreamer. Even Hamlet, whom Dr. Strong espe- 
cially quotes, while contemplating deliverance from himself by suicide, 
recognizes the after-life : — 

J The quotation is probably from E. H. A. Scherar, the French critic,— not 
W. Scherer, the more recent German author. 



SHAKSPEARE AND IMMORTALITY 105 

" O ! that this too too solid flesh would melt, 
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew ! 
Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd 
His canon 'gainst self-slaughter ! O God ! O God ! 
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable 
Seems to me all the uses of this world!" 1:2. 

In a morbidly speculative mood he says : — 

" To be, or not to be, that is the question : 
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind, to suffer 
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, 
And by opposing, end them ? — To die, — to sleep, — 
No more; and, by a sleep, to say we end 
The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks 
That flesh is heir to, — 'tis a consummation 
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, — to sleep ; — 
To sleep ! perchance to dream." 

But from this gloomy mood he is aroused by the common faith ; 
almost, he falls back into the reasonableness of a future, as he says : — 

"Ay, there's the rub ; 
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, 
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, 
Must give us pause." 

This is not a pleasant thought to one contemplating suicide, but it 
pursues him: — 

" There's the respect 
That makes calamity of so long life: 
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 
The pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay, 
The insolence of office, and the spurns 
That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 
When he himself might his quietus make 
With a bare bodkin ? who would these fardels bears, 



106 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

To grunt and sweat under a weary life ; 

But that the dread of something after death, 

The undiscovered country, from whose bourn 

No traveler returns?" 5; 1. 

Illustrations in this play are almost without number, 1 of the thought, 
current among all mankind, in all ages, that we have a moral nature, 
subject to laws that are not material or finite; and the thought of an 
after-life runs through them all: — 

" All that lives must die 
Passing through nature to eternity." 

The chief incidents proceed upon the supposition of a deathless spirit 
and all of its finest passages involve the thought. When Hamlet's 
friend Horatio discusses the uncanny appearance of the ghost he tells 
how: — 

" When the cock crew 
... it started like a guilty thing 
Upon a fearful summons." 

And Marcellus, an officer, who had been one of the watch says : — 

" It faded on the crowing of the cock. 
Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes 
Whereon our Saviour's birth is celebrated, 
The bird of dawning singeth all night long." 

Hamlet himself thinks of an after-life when he says : — 

" Would I had met my dearest foe in Heaven 
Ere I had ever seen that day, Horatio !" 

And when he is assured by his friend that they have seen his father's 
ghost, walking at the dead hour of the night, he says : — 

" My father's spirit in arms ! all is not well 
I doubt some foul play : would the night were come ! 
Till then, sit still my soul. Foul deeds will rise, 
Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes." 1 : 2. 

*See "Death" in Scripture Themes. 



SHAKSPEARB AND IMMORTALITY 107 

At midnight, the ghost appears and Horatio beseeches Hamlet not 
to follow its beckoning, but Hamlet says : — 

" Why, what should be the fear ? 
I do not set my life at a pin's fee ; 
And, for my soul, what can it do to that, 
Being a thing immortal as itself?" 1: 4. 

In the mind of Hamlet his father's spirit and his own soul are not 
merely immaterial shadows of the mortal life, but distinct existences, not 
subject to material law: — spirits, with an after-life. The ghost in the 
play is made to express the certainty of this after-life and of a judg- 
ment therein. As he describes the murder which deprived him of his 
mortal life, he says: — 

''Thus was I .... at once dispatch'd 
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin; 
Unhousel'd, 1 disappointed, 2 unanel'd 3 
No reckoning made, but sent to my account 
With all my imperfections on my head." 1:5. 

There is not a shadow of a doubt of a future state in the mind of 
Hamlet when he contemplates revenge by killing the King. He says : — 

" Now might I do it, pat, now he is praying ; 
And now I'll do't : . . ." 

But he reflects that to kill the King when he is in the act of devo- 
tions would defeat his purpose : — 4 

1 Without communion or death-bed rites. 

'Not appointed, not prepared. 

'Without extreme unction. 

* Prof. Sharp, to whose new book reference is made in the introductory preface 
offers the following comments on this subject: "The reputation of Hamlet as 
the typical doubter, the imaginative incorporation of the spirit of Montaigne, is 
one of the most extraordinary vagaries of Shakspearean criticism. Here is a man 
whose fate turns upon a visit from a disembodied spirit; a man who is expected 
by his father to count it a double wrong for the victim of assassination to be cut 
off in the midst of his sins, with no chance to purge his soul by the ministrations 
of the priest; a man who fears no ghost, because he can say: 
'And for my soul, what can it do to that, 
Being a thing immortal as itself?' 
a man, when the opportunity to discharge his commission thrusts itself upon 
him, succeeds in disguising to himself his own unwillingness to take the irrevoca- 



io8 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

". . . and so he goes to heaven: 
And so am I reveng'd? That would be scann'd: 
A villain kills my father ; and, for that, 
I, his sole son, do this same villain send 

To heaven." "No, 

When he is drunk, asleep, or in a rage; 

... or about some act 

That has no relish of salvation in't : 

Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven ; 

And that his soul may be damn'd, and black 

As hell, whereto it goes." 5:5. 

The one thought of revenge pursues him constantly but Hamlet never 
loses sight of the future life. Indeed the whole play proceeds upon the 
thought of an hereafter. Ophelia, speaking to her brother, says : — 

" Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, 
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven ; 
Whils't, like a puff' d and reckless libertine, 
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads." 1:5. 

Even the Scripture account of judgment day, as described in I Cor. 
xv. 52, is brought to mind. In the burial scene of Ophelia the Priest 
declines to observe all the usual religious rites because, he says : — 

" Her death was doubtful ; 
And but that great command o'ersways the order 
She should in ground unsanctified have lodg'd 
Till the last trumpet." 

Laertes, the brother of Ophelia, answers the priest thus : — 

" I tell thee churlish priest 
A minist'ring angel shall my sister be, 
When thou liest howling." 5: 1. 

ble step by the consideration that to kill one in prayer is to send his soul to a 
better world; a man so completely dominated by the religious view of life that 
he falls into the error of mistaking results of his own insight for the miraculous 
interference of Providence in his behalf. Truly, a sceptic of this kind would have 
little to fear from the fires of the Inquisition. Shakspeare's Portrayal of the 
Moral Life, pp. 210, 211. 



SHAKSPBARE AND IMMORTALITY 109 

And the play of Hamlet is not exceptional in the treatment by Shak- 
speare of the doctrines associated with the thought of immortality. In 
all his works the after-life is assumed. 

Macbeth, it is true, ever tries to reason himself into a materialism, 
which "would jump (risk) the life to come." Yet the thought of the 
hereafter pursues him, in his worst, as well as his best moments : — 

"... the bell invites me. 
Hear it not Duncan ; for it is a knell 
That summons thee to Heaven or to Hell." 

The same thought comes to him with increasing force as he dis- 
misses his hired assassins to do their work of death to Banquo : — 

" Banquo, thy soul's flight 
If it find Heaven, must find it out to-night." 

In his better thoughts he is troubled that he cannot pray : — 

"... wherefore could I not pronounce amen? 
I had most need of blessing, and Amen 
Stuck in my throat." 

While he is ever anxious to make gain, at any cost, in this life the 
judgment of the life to come constantly haunts him. In terror he 
cries : — 

" But let 

The frame of things disjoint, both the world's suffer, 

Ere we will eat our meal in fear, and sleep 

In the affliction of these terrible dreams 

That shake us nightly: better be with the dead, 

Whom we to gain our peace, have sent to peace, 

Than on the torture of the mind to lie 

In restless ecstasy." Macb. 3: 2. 

He surrounds himself with all the safeguards which his fertile mind 
can suggest. He has his own paid spies in the houses of all dis- 
tinguished families. He says : — 

" There is not one of them but in his house 
I keep a servant fee'd." 



no RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARB 

Yet the ghosts of his victims trouble him. His conscience "will not 
down." Strong in his schemes of blood, he is weak in his superstitious 
dependence upon the miserable charm of the witches : — 

" I will to th' weird sisters : 
More shall they speak ; for now I'm bent to know, 
By the worst means, the worst. 

It is very natural that such a man, wrought up to a pitch of frenzy, 
at the news of the death of Lady Macbeth should exclaim: "Life's 
but a walking shadow." 

The play, as a whole, presents a fearful picture of a man who trusted 
in the powers of evil to sustain him in his wrongdoing, and did his 
best to discredit the retribution of the future life. But, as the play pro- 
ceeds, one has no fear of the reputation of Heaven. The portrait drawn 
by Macduff is strongly drawn, but true : — 

" Not in the legions 
Of horrid Hell can come a devil more damn'd 
In evils to top Macbeth." 4: 3. 

When he dies like a mad beast at bay and peace reigns with the 
"grace of Grace" no one can feel that testimony has been borne against 
the immortality of man. 

Again, very much that is best in Romeo and Juliet would be absent 
if the religious element were eliminated, and there would be no meaning 
to the religion in the play without the thought of the hereafter. 

When Juliet lies, apparently dead, through the agency of the potion 
administered by the friar, her father cries : — 

" O child ! O child ! my soul and not my child ! — 
Dead art thou ! alack ! my child is dead ! 
And with my child my joys are buried." 

And the old friar replies : — 

" Peace, ho, for shame, confusion's cure lives not 
In these confusions. Heaven and yourself 
Had part in this fair maid ; now Heaven hath all, 
And all the better is it for the maid ; 
Your part in her you could not keep from death ; 
But Heaven keeps His part in eternal life. 



SHAKSPEARB AND IMMORTALITY in 

The most you sought was her promotion ; 
For t'was your heaven, she should be advanc'd : 
And weep you now, seeing she is advanc'd 
Above the clouds, as high as heaven itself?" 

And when Romeo inquires the news of his servant he asks: — 

" How doth my lady ? Is my father well ? 
How doth my lady Juliet ? That I ask again : 
For nothing can be ill, if she be well." 

The servant answers : — 

" Then she is well, and nothing can be ill. 
Her body sleeps in Capel's monument, 
And her immortal part with angels lives." 

The play of Richard III. teems with suggestion of the after-life. It 
is in the dream of the Duke of Clarence ; as he lies in prison, with the 
prospect of death before him he says : — 

" That as I am a Christian faithful man, 
I would not spend another such a night 
Though t'were to buy a world of happy days." 

And when Brakenbury asks him if he did not "awake at this sore 
agony" he says : — 

" No, no, my dream was lengthen'd after life ; 
O, then began the tempest of my soul ! 
I pass'd, methought, the melancholy flood 
With that sour ferryman which poets write of, 
Unto the kingdom of perpetual night." Rich. III. 1:4. 

The future state is in the conversation of the two murderers as they 
talk of "conscience" and "judgment-day;" and in King Edward's 
reflections, as he says : — 

" I every day expect an ambassage 
From my dear Redeemer to redeem me hence ; 
And more to peace my soul shall part to Heaven 
Since I have made my friends at peace on earth." 



ii2 RELIGIOUS WORLD OF SHAKSPEARE 

In Queen Margaret's curses upon the King and in Richard's forecast 
of the coming judgment upon himself we find the same thought of the 
after-life. 

How beautiful are the lines of Lorenzo to Jessica in the Merchant 
OF Venice, but how meaningless they would be without the thought of 
immortality : — 

" Sit, Jessica : look how the floor of Heaven 
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold ; 
There's not the smallest orb, which thou behold'st, 
But in his motion like an angel sings, 
Still 'quiring to the young-ey'd cherubins : 
Such harmony is in immortal souls ; 
But, whil'st this muddy vesture of decay 
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it." 

Mer. of Ven. 5:1. 

In the Sonnets, too, the Poet presents this truth : — 

" Thou by thy dial's shady stealth may'st know 

Time's thievish progress to eternity." 
" Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain 

Full character'd with lasting memory, 

Which shall above that idle rank remain, 

Beyond all date, even to eternity." 

The scene in II Henry VI. at the death of Cardinal Beaufort, quoted 
at length elsewhere in this volume, 1 is a striking testimony of this mor- 
tal looking for immortality. Commenting on this scene Schlegel 
remarks : "Can any other poet be named who has drawn aside the cur- 
" tain of eternity at the close of this life with such overpowering and 
" awful effect ? And yet it is not mere horror with which the mind is 
" filled, but solemn emotion ; a blessing and a curse stand side by side ; 
" the pious King is an image of the heavenly mercy which, even in the 
" sinner's last moments labors to enter his soul. " 2 

If any are looking for a final word on this great subject let them not 
ask it of Shakspeare. But if we would find a consistent and faithful wit- 

1 See " Death " in Scripture Themes. 
'Dramatic Literature. A. W. Schlegel. 



SHAKSPEARB AND IMMORTALITY 113 

ness to the Scriptural doctrine of Immortality we may turn with profit 
to the testimony of all his great dramas. 

Nowhere does Shakspeare conflict with the glorious assurance of 
Jesus Christ "who both brought life and immortality to light through 
the gospel." 

And we may perhaps see a more direct revelation of the mind of 
the Poet himself in his most noble sonnet : — 

" Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, 
Fool'd by those rebel powers that thee array, 
Why dost thou pine within, and suffer death, 
Painting thy onward walls so costly gay? 
Why so large cost, having so short a lease, 
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? 
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, 
Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end? 
Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss. 
And let that pine to aggravate thy store ; 
Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; 
Within be fed, without be rich no more: 
So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men, 
And, Death once dead, there's no more dying then." 

Sonnet 146. 

Indeed, this inspiring theme is everywhere. As Shakspeare is the 
mirror of the universal mind so he reflects the universal hope in his 
works, while his own absolute faith is declared in the opening words of 
his Will : — 

" / commend my soul into the hands of God my creator, hoping, and 
assuredly believing, through the only merits of Jesus Christ, my Sav- 
iour, to be made partaker of life everlasting." 
8 



BOOK FOURTH 



Scripture Themes in Shakspeare 



CONSISTING OF NUMEROUS QUOTATIONS FROM SHAK- 
SPEARE OF MORAL AND RELIGIOUS TRUTHS, AR- 
RANGED UNDER SEPARATE HEADINGS 



115 



SCRIPTURE THUMBS IN SHAKSPBARB 

This part of our work partakes of the character of a cyclopedia of 
Biblical and moral texts found in the dramas and poems of Shakspeare. 

It must not, however, be understood as embracing all the moral say- 
ings of the great author's works. Only those passages have been 
selected which are, in the mind of the writer, directly, or indirectly, 
related in thought, spirit, or figure to the doctrine and morals of the 
Bible, or to the accepted teachings of the Christian religion. A much 
larger volume than this would be necessary for a classification of the 
numerous wise, philosophic and moral sayings of Shakspeare. 

In all such quotations there is a danger of reading into the author's 
words and making current, a meaning that is not justified by the whole 
text and context. Every reader of the Bible is aware of this danger; 
it is therefore, only necessary to point it out in order to avoid the mis- 
take here. 

In preparing these pages the writer has had to face the difficult task 
of placing the quotations, under right headings, without frequent repeti- 
tion. The genius of Shakspeare presents truths so many-sided that 
often, in a few lines, several subjects are included. 

In a few instances passages are repeated under separate headings. 
Thus, for example, in II Hen. VI. 3 .2 we have this : "Thrice is he 
arm'd that hath his quarrel just," which with a slight addition is placed 
under the topic "Conscience" as well as "Justice," and the passage 
from Measure for Measure which opens : — 

" He who the sword of Heaven will bear 
Should be as holy as severe," 

seems to be as appropriate to the subject of " Christian Ministry" as 
to "Justice" and has been placed under both heads. 

On the other hand, in some cases, two or more topics have been 
placed together because it is found that the quotations so directly refer 
to more than one subject that they are inseparable; as for example 

117 



n8 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

"Life and Time," "Gratitude and Ingratitude," "Slander and Malice," 
while in, at least, one case, subjects which seem to be akin have been 
divided because of the Poet's special reference to one or both of them 
respectively. Thus, — "Grace before Meat" might have been placed 
under the general head of "Praise" but that there are several special 
references to the first topic which by themselves are of peculiar interest. 

The conversation between Lucio and two gentlemen in Measure for 
Measure 1 :2, illustrates this : Lucio says : — 

"Thou concludest like the sanctimonious pirate that went to sea with 
the ten commandments, but scraped one out of the table. 

2 Gent. Thou shalt not steal? 

Lucio. Ay, that he razed. 

i Gent. Why, 'twas a commandment to command the captain and 
all the rest from their functions ; they put forth to steal : There's not 
a soldier of us all that, in the thanksgiving before meat, doth relish the 
petition well that prays for peace. 

2 Gent. I never heard any soldier dislike it. 

Lucio. I believe thee, for I think thou never wast where grace was 
said." 

In this brief conversation we have four subjects of interest: — 
i. Hypocrisy of the pirate "with the ten commandments." 

2. A recognition of the pious practice of "thanksgiving before meat." 

3. The prevailing impiety of a soldier's life. 

4. That a trained soldier's business and interests are opposed to peace. 

The passages in "Scripture Themes in Shakspeare" include some that 
do not directly bear any reference to a Scripture subject, but it will be 
found that such passages contain the Christian spirit and teaching in a 
marked degree. This will be specially observed in the selections on 
Peace and War. 

Some of the passages are given because a Bible name or character 
is quoted, thus showing that the author had Scripture thought and 
figure in his mind while writing. Two passages may be cited as illus- 
trating this principle of selection. 

Under the head of "Virtue" a figure of beauty is given from Sonnet 
93: thus — 

" How like Eve's apple doth" thy beauty grow." 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 119 

In the passage from Measure for Measure 2 : 4, — 

" Better it were a brother died at once 
Than that a sister, by redeeming him, 
Should die forever," 

there is no Biblical quotation, or direct Scriptural reference, but these 
beautiful lines contain the doctrine of purity revolting at sin ; and also 
that death and sin are forever inseparable, a teaching which is faith- 
fully maintained throughout the entire works of Shakspeare. 

These illustrations will be sufficient to explain the arrangement of 
this part of our work. 

AMBITION 

Ambition, Thou scarlet sin. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

Virtue is chok'd with foul ambition. II Hen. VI. 3: i". 

Banish the canker of ambitious thoughts. II Hen. VI. 1:2. 

The devil speed him ! No man's pie is free'd 
From his ambitious finger. Hen. VIII. 1: 1. 

Love and meekness, 
Become a churchman better than ambition. Hen. VIII. 5: 2. 

Too much honor : 
O, 'tis a burden, Cromwell, 'tis a burden 
Too heavy for a man that hopes for heaven. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition ; 

By that sin fell the angels ; how can man then, 

The image of his Maker, hope to win by 't? Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

Ambition's debt is paid . . . 

O mighty Caesar ! dost thou lie so low ? 

Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoilfe, 

Shrunk to this little Measure? lul. Caesat 3:1. 



120 SCRIPTURE, THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

To see how God in all his creatures works ! 

Yea, man and birds are fain of climbing high. II Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

'Tis a common proof 
That lowliness is young ambition's ladder, 
Whereto the climber-upward turns his face ; 
But, when he once attains the upmost round, 
He then unto the ladder turns his back, 
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees 
By which he did ascend. Jul. Caesar 2: 1. 

God's will ! I pray thee, wish not one man more. 

By love, I am not covetous for gold ; 

Nor care I who feed upon my cost ; 

But if it be a sin to covet honor 

I am the most offending soul alive. . . . 

God's peace ! I would not lose so great an honor 

For the best hope I have. Hen. V. 4: 3. 

Ill-weaved ambition, how much art thou shrunk ! 

When that this body did contain a spirit, 

A kingdom for it was too small a bound ; 

But now, — two paces of the vilest earth 

Is room enough : — ... 

Adieu, and take thy praise with thee to heaven ! 

Thy ignominy sleep with thee in the grave, 

But not remember'd in thy epitaph ! / Hen. IV. 5: 4. 

He wants nothing of a god but Eternity, and a heaven to throne 
in. (See Heaven.) Corio. 5: 4. 

O God ! I could be bound in a nut-shell, or count myself a king of 
infinite space ; were it not that I have had bad dreams. 

Which dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the 
ambition is merely the shadow of a dream. Ham. 2: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 121 



CHARITY— GENEROSITY— HOSPITALITY 

Charity, — 
Which renders good for bad, blessings for cursings. 
(See Forgiveness.) Rich. III. 1:2. 

You bear a gentle mind, and heavenly blessings 
Follow such creatures. Hen. VIII. 2:3. 

Bound by my charity, and my bless'd order, 
I come to visit the afflicted spirits 
Here in the prison: do me the common right 
To let me see them, and to make me know 
The nature of their crimes, that I may minister 
To them accordingly. Me as. for Me as. 2: 5. 

My master is of churlish disposition, 
And little recks to find the way to heaven 
By doing deeds of hospitality: 
Besides, his cote, his flocks, and bounds of feed, 
Are now on sale, and at our sheepcote now, 
By reason of his absence, there is nothing 
That you will feed on ; but what is, come see, 
And in my voice most welcome shall you be. 

As You Like It 2: 

That churchman bears a bounteous mind indeed, 
A hand as fruitful as the land that feeds us ; 
His dews are everywhere. . . . 

. . . No doubt he's noble ; 
He had a black mouth that said other of him. . . 
He may? . . . he has wherewithal ; in him, 
Sparing would show a worse sin than ill doctrine: 
Men of his way should be most liberal, 
They are set here for examples. Hen. VIII. 1:3. 



122 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

CHRISTIAN MINISTRY— CLERGYMEN 

You holy clergymen. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

More needs she the divine than the physician. Macb. 5: /. 

Sermons in stones, and good in everything. As You Like It 2: 1. 

Meditating with two divines ; 

See where his grace stands 'tween two clergymen ! Rich. III. 3: 7. 

Do not as some ungracious pastors do, 

Show me the steep and thorny way to Heaven, 

Whilst, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, 

Himself the primrose path of dalliance tread, 

And recks not his own read. 1 (See Hypocrisy.) Ham. 1: ?. 

God forbid — 

That you should fashion, wrest, or bow your reading, 

Or nicely charge your understanding 

With open titles miscreate 2 whose right "— 

Suits not in native colors with the truth ; . . . 

We charge you in the name of God, take heed. Hen. V. 1: 2. 

He who the sword of Heaven will bear - 
Should be as holy as severe ; 
Pattern in himself to know, 
Grace to stand,, and virtue go. 

(See Justice.) \ Me as. for Meas. 3: 2. 

Thou art reverent 
Touching thy spiritual function, not thy life. . . . 
Who should be pitiful, if you be not? 
Or who should study to prefer a peace, 
If holy churchmen take delight in broils? 
... I have heard you preach 
That malice was a great and grievous sin : 
And will you not maintain the thing you teach, 
But prove a chief offender in the same? / Hen. VI. 5: /. 

1 doctrine. * spurious. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 123 

How I have sped among the clergymen, 
The sums I have collected shall express. 
But, as I travell'd hither through the land, 
I find the people strangely fantasied; 
Possess'd with rumors, full of idle dreams; 
Not knowing what they fear, but full of fear : 
And here's a prophet, that I brought with me 
From forth the streets of Pomfret, whom I found 
With many hundred treading on his heels : 
To whom he sung, in rude harsh-sounding rhymes, 
That, ere the next Ascension day at noon, 
Your highness should deliver up your crown, 

Is this Ascension-day ? Did not the prophet 
Say that before Ascension-day at noon, 
My crown I should. give off? Even so I have: 
I did suppose it should be on constraint ; 
But, heaven be thank 'd it is but voluntary. 

King John 4: 2 and 5: 1. 

It better show'd with you, 
When that your flock, assembled by the bell, 
Encircled you to hear with reverence 
Your exposition on the holy text, 
Than now to see you here an iron man, 
Cheering a rout of rebels with your drum, 
Turning the word to sword, and life to death. 

Who hath net heard it spoken, 

Hew deep you were within the books of Heaven? 

To us, the speaker in his parliament ; 

To us the imagin'd voice of Heaven, itself; 

The very opener and intelligencer, 

Between the grace, the sanctities of Heaven, 

And our dull workings : O, who shall believe, - 

But you misuse the reverence of your place ; 

Employ the countenance and grace of Heaven 

As a false favorite doth his prince's name, 

In deeds dishonorable? You have taken up, 

Under the counterfeited zeal of Heaven, 

The subjects of Heaven's substitute, my father; 

And, both against the peace of Heaven and him. 77 Hen. IV. 4: 2. 



124 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

It is a good divine that follows his own instructions; I can easier 
teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to 
follow mine own teaching. Mer. of Ven. 1:2. 



COMFORT 

God comfort him in this necessity. I Hen. VI. 4: 3. 

I am come to advise with you, and comfort you and pray with you. 

Meas. for Meas. 4: 3. 

That comfort comes too late 
'Tis like pardon after execution. Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 

I conjure thee, as thou believ'st 
There is another comfort than this world. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 

Comfort's in heaven : and we are on earth, 

Where nothing lives, but crosses, care and grief. Rich. II. 2: 2. 

Now God be praised ! that to believing souls 

Gives light in darkness, comfort in despair. 77 Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

How mightily, sometimes, we make us comforts of our losses. . . . 
The web of our life is of mingled yarn, good and ill together; our vir- 
tues would be proud if our faults whipped them not ; and our crimes 
would despair if they were not cherished by our virtues. 

All's Well 4:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 125 

CONSCIENCE 

Conscience does make cowards of us all. Ham. 3: /. 

How is't with me when every noise appals me? Macb. 2: 2. 

. . . Wash every mote out of his conscience. Hen. V. 4: 1. 

There's something in me that reproves my fault. 

Twelfth Night 3: 4. 

Hence both are gone with conscience and remorse. Rich. III. 4: 3. 

I'll teach you how you shall arraign your conscience. 

Me as. for Meas. 2: 3. 

Having God, her conscience and these bars against me. 

Rich. III. 1: 2. 

A good conscience will make any possible satisfaction. 

// Hen. IV. Bpil. 

Bear not along 
The clogging burthen of a guilty soul. Rich. II. 1: 3. 

The heaviness and guilt within my bosom 
Takes off my manhood. Cymb. 5: 2. 

The color of the king doth come and go 

Between his purpose and his conscience. King lohn 4:2. 

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind 

The thief doth fear each bush an officer. 77/ Hen. VI. 5: 6. 

Love is too young to know what conscience is 

Yet who knows not, conscience is born of love. Sonnet 151. 

So much my conscience whispers in your ear 
Which none but Heaven, and you, and I shall hear. 

King lohn 1: 1. 



126 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

I know that thou art religious, 
And hast a thing within thee called conscience ; 
Therefore, I urge thy oath. (See Religious Vows.) 

Titus And. 5: 1. 

Go to your bosom, 
Knock there; and ask your heart what it doth know 
That's like my brother's fault. Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

Art thou anything? 
Art thou some god, some angel, or some devil, 
That makest my blood cold, and my hair to stare ? Jul. Caesar 4: 3. 

I feel within me 
A peace above all earthly dignities 
A still and quiet conscience. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

The worm of conscience still be-gnaw thy soul ! 

Thy friends suspect for traitors whil'st thou liv'st, 

And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends ! Rich. III. 1: 3. 

My conscience ! thou art fetter'd 
More than my shanks and wrists : You good gods give me 
The penitent instrument, to pick that bolt 
Then, free for ever! Cymb. 5:4. 

What stronger breast-plate than a heart untainted! 

Thrice is he arm'd that hath his quarrel just; 

And he but naked, though lock'd up in steel, 

Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted. (See Justice.) 

II Hen. VI. 3:2. 

O coward conscience how dost thou afflict me ! 

My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, 

And every tongue brings in a several tale, 

And every tale condemns me for a villain. (See Remorse.) 

Rich. III. 5:3. 

For murther, though it have no tongue, will speak 
With some miraculous organ. . . . 

The play's the thing 
Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king. Ham. 2: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 127 

I'll haunt thee like a wicked conscience 

That maketh goblins swift as frenzy thought. 

Troi. and Cress. 5: //. 

. . . graceless, holds he disputation 

'Tween frozen conscience and hot-burning will, 

And with good thoughts makes dispensation, 

Urging the worser sense for vantage still. Lucrece. St. 36. 

Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive 
Against thy mother aught; leave her to heaven, 
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, 
To prick and sting her. Ham. 1:5. 

Conscience is a word that cowards use, 

Devis'd at first to keep the strong in awe : 

Our strong arms be our conscience, swords our law. 

March on, join bravely, let us to't pell-mell; 

If not to Heaven, then hand in hand to Hell. Rich. HI. 5: 3. 

O, 'tis too true ! 
How smart a lash that speech doth give my conscience ! 
The harlot's cheek, beautied with plast'ring art, 
Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it, 
Than is my deed to my most painted word : 
O heavy burden ! Ham. 5: 1. 

Canst thou minister to a mind diseas'd: 
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow ; 
Raze out the written troubles of the brain; 
And, with some sweet oblivious antidote, 
Cleanse the stuff 'd bosom of that perilous stuff, 
Which weighs upon her heart? Macb. 5:3. 

Come, come, and sit you down : you shall not budge ; 
You go not, till I set you up a glass, 
Where you may see the inmost part of you. 

. . . O Hamlet, speak no more; 
Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul ; 
And there I see such black and grained spots 
As will not leave their tinct. Ham. 5: 4. 



128 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Between the acting of a dreadful thing 

And the first motion, all the interim is 

Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream : 

The genius and the mortal instruments 

Are then in council : and the state of man 

Like to a little kingdom, suffers then 

The nature of an insurrection. Jul. Caesar 2: 1. 

O, this life 
Is nobler than attending for a check ; 
Richer than doing nothing for a bribe 
Prouder, than rustling in unpaid-for silk ; 
... I have lived at honest freedom ; paid 
More pious debts to heaven, than in all 

The fore-end of my time 

. . . heaven and my conscience knows 
Thou didst unjustly banish me. Cymb. 3:3. 

God Almighty ! 
There is some soul of goodness in things evil, 
Would men observingly distil it out ; 
For our bad neighbor makes us early stirrers, 
Which is both healthful and good husbandry : 
Besides they are our outward consciences, 
And preachers to us all ; admonishing 
That we should dress us fairly for our end. 
Thus may we gather honey from the weed, 
And make a moral of the devil himself. Hen. V. 4: 1, 

My conscience first receiv'd a tenderness 

Scruple and prick, on certain speeches utter'd 

This respite shook 
The bosom of my conscience, enter'd me, 
Yea, with a splitting power, and made to tremble 

The region of my breast : Thus hulling in 

The wild sea of my conscience, I did steer 
Toward this remedy, whereupon we are 
Now present here together ; that is to say, 
I meant to rectify my conscience, — which 
I then did feel sick, and yet not well, — 
By all the reverend fathers of the land 
And doctors learn'd. Hen. VIII. 2: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 129 

The play of Macbeth should be read as a zvhole for a study on Con- 
science. . . The sense of guilt and of a sin-stricken heart is strikingly 
portrayed in the following passages from that play: — 

Macb. There's one did laugh in his sleep, 
And one cried " murder! " that they did wake each other; 
I stood and heard them : but they did say their prayers. 
And address'd them again to sleep. 

Lady. M. There are two lodg'd together. 

Macb. One cried "God bless us !" and "Amen," the other; 
As they had seen me, with these hangman's hands x 
Listening their fear, I could not say, amen, 
When they did say, God bless us. 

Lady M. Consider it not so deeply. 

Macb. But wherefore could not I pronounce, amen? 
I had most need of blessing, and amen 

Stuck in my throat 

Whence is that knocking? 
How is't with me, when every noise appals me? 
What hands are here ? * Ha ! they pluck out mine eyes ! 
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
Clean from my hand ? No ; this my hand will rather 
The multitudinous seas incarnadine, 
Making the green — one red. Macb. 2: 2. 

In the Night-watch when the Doctor comes to view the troubled Lady 
Macbeth in her sleep-ivalkings we have the following: — 

Lady M. Yet here's the spot. 

Doct. Hark, she speaks ; I will set down what comes from her, to 
satisfy my remembrance the more strongly. 

Lady M. Out, damned spot ! out I say ! One ; Two : Why then 'tis 
time to do't: — Hell is murky: Fie, my lord fie! a soldier, and afeard? 
What need we fear who knows it when none can call our power to 
account? 

Doct. Do you mark that ? 

Lady M. . . . What, will these hands ne'er be clean? Here's the 
smell of the blood still : all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this 
little hand. Oh ! oh ! oh ! 

Doct. What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged. 

1 Macbeth looks upon his hands stained with blood. 
9 



130 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Gent. I would not have such a heart in my bosom, for the dignity of 
the whole body. 

Doct. Well, well, well, — 
Gent. Pray God, it be sir. 

Doct. This disease is beyond my practice : Yet I have known those 
who have walked in their sleep who have died holily in their beds. 

Lady M. Wash your hands, put on your night-gown; look not so 
pale : — I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried ; he cannot come out on's 
grave. . . . 

Doct. . . . Infected minds 

To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets. 
More needs she the divine than the physician. — 
God, God, forgive us all ! Macb. 5: 1. 

Second Mur. Some certain dregs of conscience are yet within me. 

First Mur. Remember our reward, when the deed's done. 

Sec. Mur. Come he dies ! I had forgot the reward. 

First Mur. Where's thy conscience now? 

Sec. Mur. Oh, in the duke of Gloster's purse. 

First Mur. When he opens his purse to give us our reward, thy 
conscience flies out. 

Sec. Mur. 'Tis no matter ; let it go ; there's few, or none will enter- 
tain it. 

First Mur. What if it come to thee again? 

Sec. Mur. I'll not meddle with it, it is a dangerous thing, it makes a 
man a coward ; a man cannot steal but it accuseth him ; a man cannot 
swear but it checks him ; a man cannot lie with his neighbor's wife but 
it detects him : 'Tis a blushing, shame-faced spirit that mutinies in a 
man's bosom : it fills one full of obstacles : it made me once restore a 
purse of gold that by chance I found ; it beggars any man that keeps it : 
it is turned out of towns and cities for a dangerous thing; and every 
man that means to live well endeavors to trust to himself, and live 
without it. Rich. III. 1: 4. 

Conscience, say I, you counsel well; fiend, say I, you counsel well: 
to be ruled by my conscience I should stay with the Jew my master, 
. . . and to run away from the Jew I should be ruled by the fiend, who, 
is the devil himself: Certainly, the Jew is the very devil incarnation: 
and, in my conscience, my conscience is a kind of hard conscience, to 
offer to counsel me to stay with the Jew. Mer. of Ven. 2: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 131 

DEATH AND THE FUTURE— ETERNITY 

A royal fellowship of death! Hen. V. 4:8. 

He that dies, pays all debts. Tempest 3: 2. 

Death, death, O, amiable, lovely death ! King John 3: 4. 

O death, made proud with pure and princely beauty. 

King John 4: 3. 

A man can die but once — we owe a death. 1 77 Hen. IV. 3: 2. 

Where art thou death? . . . This mortal house I'll ruin. 

Ant. and Cleo. 5; 2. 

Death, as the Psalmist saith, is certain to all; all shall die. 

II Hen. IV. 3:2. 

The wills above be done ! but I would fain die a dry death. 

Tempest 1: 1. 

Seeing that death, a necessary end, 
Will come when it will come. Jul. Caesar 2: 2. 

It is a knell 
That summons thee to heaven, or to hell. Macb. 2: 1. 

Immortality attends the former, 
Making a man a god. Pericles 3: 2. 

Thou know'st 'tis common ! all that lives must die 
Passing through nature to eternity. Ham. 1:2. 

O heavens ! is't possible, a young maid's wits 
Should be as mortal as an old man's life? Ham. 4: 5. 

Kings and mightiest potentates must die ; 

For that's the end of human misery. I. Hen. VI. 3: 2. 

1 Some versions read, " We owe God a death." 



132 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Mount, mount, my soul! thy seat is up on high 
Whilst thy gross flesh sinks downward, here to die. 

Rich. II. 5:5. 

Come, side by side together live and die 

And soul with soul from France to heaven fly. / Hen. VI. 4: 5. 

— Men must endure 
Their going hence, even as their coming hither 
Ripeness is all. King Lear 5: 2. 

My joy is death : 
Death at whose name I oft have been afeared 
Because I wish'd this world's eternity. 77 Hen. VI. 2: 4. 

But now, the arbitrator of despairs, 

Just death, kind umpire of men's miseries, 

With sweet enlargement doth dismiss me hence. 

/ Hen. VI. 2: 5. 

Look, who comes here ! a grave unto a soul ; 
Holding the eternal spirit, against her will, 
In the vile prison of afflicted breath.. .King John 3:4. 

Then God forgive the sin of all those souls 

That to their everlasting residence 

Before the dew of evening fall, shall fleet. King John 2: I. 

Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain 
Full character'd with lasting memory, 
Which shall above that idle rank remain, 
Beyond all date, even to eternity. Sonnet 122. 

If you will live lament, if die, be brief; 

That our swift-winged souls may catch the king's ; 

Or, like obedient subjects, follow him 

To his new kingdom of ne'er changing right. Rich. III. 2:2. 

Laud be to Heaven! — even there my life must end. 

It hath been prophesied to me many years, 

I should not die but in Jerusalem ; 

Which vainly I suppos'd the Holy Land. 77 Hen. IV. 4: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 133 

When wilt — begin to patch up thine old body for heaven? 
Do not speak like a death's head: do not bid me remember mine 
end. // Hen. IV. 2: 4. 

O, I could prophesy, 
But that the earthy and cold hand of death 
Lies on my tongue : No, Percy, thou are dust, 
And food for — worms. I Hen. IV. 5: 4. 

— full of repentance, 
Continual meditations, tears, and sorrows, 
He gave his honors to the world again : 
His blessed part to heaven, and slept in peace. 
And, to add greater honors to his age 
Than man could give him, he died fearing God. 

Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 

God knows what hath bechanced them : 
But this I know, — that they have demean'd themselves 
Like men born to renown, by life, or death. 
The sands are number'd that make up my life ; 
Here must I stay, and here my life must end. 777 Hen. VI. 1: 4. 

Yet in this life 
Lie hid more thousand deaths : yet death we fear, 
That makes these odds all even. . . . 
To sue to live, I find I seek to die 

And seeking death find life: Let it come on 

. . . Darest thou die ! 
The sense of death is most in apprehension. (See Life.) 

Meas. for Meas. 3: 1. 

Have I not hideous death within my view, 
Retaining but a quantity of life, 
Which bleeds away, even as a form of wax 
Resolveth from his figure 'gainst the fire ? 
What in the world should make me now deceive, 
Since I must lose the use of all deceit? 
Why should I then be false, since it is true 
That I must die here, and live hence by truth ? 

King John 5: 4. 



134 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Lo, now my glory smear'd in dust and blood ! 

My parks, my walks, my manors that I had, 

Even now forsake me ; and of all my lands 

Is nothing left me but my body's length! 

Why, what is pomp, rule, reign, but earth and dust? 

And, live we how we can, yet die we must. /// Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces 
The solemn temples, the great globe itself, 
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, 
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, 
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff 
As dreams are made on, and our little life 
Is rounded with a sleep. Tempest 4: 1. 

That we should die we know ; 'tis but the time, 
And drawing days out, that men stand upon. 

— Why he that cuts off twenty years of life 
Cuts off so many years of fearing death. 

— Grant that, and then is death a benefit 

So we are Caesar's friends, that have abridg'd 
His time of fearing death. Jul. Caesar 3: 1. . 

Heaven and yourself 
Had part in this fair maid! now heaven hath all, 
And all the better it is for the maid : 
Your part in her you could not keep from death ; 
But heaven keeps his part in eternal life 



Her body sleeps in Capel's monument, 
And her immortal part with angels lives. 

Rom. and Jul. 4: 5 and 5: 1. 

Fear no more the heat o' the sun, 

Nor the furious winter's rages ; 
Thou thy worldly task hast done, 

Home are gone, and ta'en thy wages: 
Golden lads and lasses must, 

As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 

Fear no more the frown o' the great 
Thou are past the tyrant's stroke ; 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 135 

Care no more to clothe, and eat ; 

To thee the reed is as the oak: 
The sceptre, learning, physic, must 
All follow this, and come to dust. Song in Cymb. 4:2. 

To be, or not to be ; that is the question : — 

Whether 't is nobler in the mind, to suffer 

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune; 

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, 

And by opposing end them ? — To die, — to sleep, — 

No more ; — and, by a sleep, to say we end 

The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks 

That flesh is heir to, — 'tis a consummation 

Devoutly to be wish'd. To die ; — to sleep : — 

To sleep ! perchance to dream : — ay, there's the rub ; 

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, 

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, 

Must give us pause. There's the respect 

That makes calamity of so long life : 

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 

The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 

The pangs of despis'd love, the law's delay, 

The insolence of office, and the spurns 

That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 

When he himself might his quietus make 

With a bare bodkin ? who would these fardels bear, 

To grunt and sweat under a weary life, 

But that the dread of something after death, — 

The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn 

No traveler returns. Ham. 3: r. 

Claud. Death is a fearful thing. 

I sab. And shamed life a hateful. 

Claud. Ay, but to die, and go we know not where ; 
To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot ; 
This sensible warm motion to become 
A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit 
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside 
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice : 
To be imprison'd in the viewless winds, 
And blown with restless violence round about 



136 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

The pendent world ; or to be worse than worst 

Of those that lawless and uncertain thoughts 

Imagine howling ! — 't is too horrible. 

The weariest and most loathed worldly life, 

That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment 

Can lay on nature, is a paradise 

To what we fear of death. Meas. for Meas. 3: 1. 

Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs ; 

Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes 

Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth. 

Let's choose executors, and talk of wills: 

And yet not so, for what can we bequeath, 

Save our deposed bodies to the ground? 

Our lands, our lives, and all are Bolingbroke's, 

And nothing can we call our own but death, 

And that small model of the barren earth, 

Which serves as paste and cover to our bones. 

For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground, 

And tell sad stories of the death of kings : 

How some have been depos'd, some slain in war. 

Some haunted by the ghosts they have depos'd, 

Some poison'd by their wives, some sleeping kill'd, 

All murder'd ; — for within the hollow crown, 

That rounds the mortal temples of a king, 

Keeps death his court, and there the antic sits, 

Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp ; 

Allowing him a breath, a little scene, 

To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks, 

Infusing him with self and vain conceit, 

As if this flesh, which walls about our life, 

Were brass impregnable; and, humor'd thus, 

Comes at the last, and with a little pin 

Bores through his castle wall, and — farewell king! 

Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood 

With solemn reverence : throw away respect, 

Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty, 

For you have but mistook me all this while: 

I live with bread like you, feel want, 

Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus, 

How can you say to me — I am a king? Rich. II. 5: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 137 

The death scene of Cardinal Beaufort as presented in II Hen. VI., 
powerfully describes the end of an ambitious man, whose life was 
strangely inconsistent with his high office in the church. 

Beau. If thou be'st death, I'll give thee England's treasure, 
Enough to purchase such another island, 
So thou wilt let me live, and feel no pain. 

K. Hen. Ah, what a sign it is of evil life, 
Where death's approach is seen so terrible ! 

War. Beaufort, it is thy sovereign speaks to thee. 

Beau. Bring me unto my trial when you will. 
Died he not in his bed? where should he die? 
Can I make men live, whe'r they will or no ? — 
O ! torture me no more, I will confess. — 
Alive again ? then show me where he is : 
I'll give a thousand pound to look upon him. — 
He hath no eyes, the dust hath blinded them. — 
Comb down his hair : look ! look ! it stands upright, 
Like lime-twigs set to catch my winged soul. — 
Give me some drink; and bid the apothecary 
Bring the strong poison that I bought of him. 

K. Hen. O, thou eternal mover of the heavens, 
Look with a gentle eye upon this wretch ! 
O ! beat away the busy meddling fiend, 
That lays strong siege unto this wretch's soul, 
And from his bosom purge this black despair. 

War. See, how the pangs of death do make him grin. 

Sal. Disturb him not; let him pass peaceably. 

K. Hen. Peace to his soul, if God's good pleasure be ! 
Lord cardinal, if thou think'st on heaven's bliss, 
Hold up thy hand, make signal of thy hope. {Beau, dies) 
He dies, and makes no sign. — O God, forgive him ! 

War. So bad a death argues a monstrous life. 

K. Hen. Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all. — 
Close up his eyes, and draw the curtain close, 
And let us all to meditation. 77. Hen. VI. 3:5. 

" So 'a cried out — God, God, God ! three or four times ; now I, to 
comfort him, bid him 'a should not think of God. I hoped there was 
no need to trouble himself with such thoughts yet. Mrs. Quickly's 
account of the death of Fallstaff. Hen. V. 2: 3. 



138 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

DEATH, PREPARATION FOR 

Make peace with God, for you must die. Rich. III. i: 4. 

They have said their prayers, and they stay for death. 

Hen. V. 4: 2. 

If it (death) be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all. 

Ham. 5:2. 

'Tis a vile thing to die . . . 
When men are unprepared, and look not for it. Rich. III. 3:2. 

Men must endure 
Their going hence, even as their coming hither: 
Ripeness (readiness) is all. King Lear 5: 2. 

He's not prepared for death ! . . . 

. . . Shall we serve Heaven 
With less respect than we do minister 
To our gross selves ? Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, 

Unhousel'd, disappointed, unaneled : 

No reckoning made, but sent to my account 

With all my imperfections on my head. Ham. 1: 5. 

If you bethink yourself of any crime, 

Unreconcil'd as yet to heaven and grace, 

Solicit for it straight. 

I would not kill thy unprepared spirit; 

No, heaven forfend, I would not kill thy soul. Othello 5: 2. 

I have hope to live, and am prepar'd to die. 

Be absolute for death; either death, or life, 

Shall thereby be the sweeter. Reason thus with life : — 

If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing 

That none but fools would keep. Meas. for Meas. 3: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 139 

God almighty ! 
There is some soul of goodness in things evil, . . . 
They are our outward consciences, 
And preachers to us all; admonishing 
That we should dress ourselves fairly for our end. Hen. V. 4: 1. 

Cowards die many times before their death; 

The valiant never taste of death but once. 

Of the wonders that I yet have heard, 

It seems to me most strange that men should fear: 

Seeing that death, a necessary end, 

Will come when it will come. Jul. Caesar 2: 2. 

My frail mortality to know itself, 

And by those fearful objects to prepare 

This body, like to them, to what I must: 

For death remember'd should be like a mirror, 

Who tells us, life's but breath ; to trust it, error. 

I'll make my will, then ; and as sick men do, 

Who know the world, see heaven, but feeling woe, 

Gripe not at earthly joys, as erst they did: 

So, I bequeath a happy peace to you, 

And all good men, as every prince should do: 

My riches to the earth from whence they came, 

But my unspotted fire of love to you. 

Thus, ready for the way of life or death, 

I wait the sharpest blow. Pericles 1: 1. 

Every soldier in the wars do as every sick man in his bed, — wash 
every mote out of his conscience : and dying so, death is to him advan- 
tage; or not dying, the time was blessedly lost (occupied), wherein 
such preparation was gained : And in him that escapes it were not 
sin to think that making God so free an offer He let him outlive that 
day to see his greatness, and to teach others how they should prepare. 

Hen. V. 4: 1. 



MO SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

FAITHFULNESS— FRIENDSHIP— CONSTANCY 

My heart doth joy, that yet in all my life 

I found no man but he was true to me. Jul. Caesar 5: 5. 

. . . recall the good Camillo. 
Whom I proclaim a man of truth, of mercy : . . . 

. . . and how his piety 
Doth my deeds make the blacker. Winter's Tale 5: 2. 

With all my love I do commend me to you : 
And what so poor a man as Hamlet is 
May do, to express his love and friending to you 
God willing, shall not lack. Ham. 1: 5. 

Love all, trust a few, 
Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy: 
Rather in power than use ; and keep thy friend 
Under thy own life's key : be check'd for silence, 
But never tax'd for speech. What Heaven more will, 
That thee may furnish, and my prayers pluck down, 
Fall on thy head ! All's Well 1: 1. 

. . . When he was poor, 
Imprison'd and in scarcity of friends, 
I clear'd him with five talents. Greet him from me, 
Bid him suppose some good necessity 
Touches his friend, which craves to be remember'd 
With those five talents. Timon 2: 2. 

Since my dear soul was mistress of my choice, 
And could of men distinguish, her election 
Hath seal'd thee for herself : for thou hast been 
As one in suffering all, that suffers nothing; 
A man that fortune's buffets and rewards 
Has taken with equal thanks. 

Give me that man 
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him 
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart, 
As I do thee. Ham. 3: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 141 

A friend should bear his friend's infirmities. Jul. Caesar 4: 3. 

There are no tricks in plain and simple faith. Jul. Caesar 4: 2. 

O Heaven ! were man 
But constant, he were perfect: that one error 
Fills him with faults; makes him run through all sins. 

Two Gent. 5: 4. 

I have trusted thee, Camillo 
With all the nearest things to my heart, as well 
My chamber-councils : wherein, priest-like, thou 
Hast cleansed my bosom. Winter's Tale 1: 2. 

Heaven bear witness, 
And if I have a conscience let it sink me, 
Even as the axe falls, if I be not faithful. 
The law I bear no malice for my death, 
It has done upon the premises but justice: 
But those that sought it I could wish more Christians: 
Be what they will, I heartily forgive them. 
Yet let them look they glory not in mischief, 
Nor build their evils on the graves of great men; 
For then my guiltless blood must cry against them. 
For further life in this world I ne'er hope, 
Nor will I sue, although the king have mercies 
More than I dare make faults. You few that lov'd me, 
And dare be bold to weep for Buckingham, 
His noble friends and fellows, whom to leave 
Is only bitter to him, only dying, 
Go with me, like good angels, to my end ; 
And, as the long divorce of steel falls on me, 
Make of your prayers one sweet sacrifice, 
And lift my soul to heaven. — Lead on, o' God's name. 

Hen. VIII. 2: 1. 

Ceremony was but devis'd at first, 

To set a gloss on faint deeds, hollow welcomes, 

Recanting goodness, sorry ere 't is shown ; 

But where there is true friendship, there needs none. . . 



142 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

What need we have any friends, if we should ne'er have need of 
'em? they were the most needless creatures living, should we ne'er 
have use for 'em; and would most resemble sweet instruments hung 
up in cases, that keep their sounds to themselves. Timon 1:2. 



FALSEHOOD— FLATTERY— DECEIT 

... A quicksand of deceit. Ill Hen. VI. 5: 4. 

Flattery is the bellows blows up sin. Pericles 1:2. 

One may smile and smile and be a villain. Ham. 1: 5. 

O, what may man within him hide, 

Though angel on the outer side. Meas. for Meas. 3:2. 

Ah, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes, 

And with a virtuous visor hide deep vice ! Rich. III. 2: 2. 

These lies are like the father that begets them : 

Gross as a mountain, open, palpable. / Hen. IV. 2: 4. 

Time shall unfold what plighted cunning hides, 

Who covers faults at last with shame derides. King Lear 1:1. 

O that man's ears should be 
To counsel deaf, but not to flattery! Timon 1:2. 

. . . His kisses are Judas's own children, 
And his kissing is as full of sanctity as the touch of holy bread. 

As You Like It 3: 4. 

To lapse in fulness 
Is sorer than to lie for need; and falsehood 
Is worse in kings than beggars. Cymb. 3:6. 

Who having unto truth, by telling of it : 
Made such a sinner of his memory 
To credit his own lie. Tempest 1:2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 143 

Now I think on't, 
They should be good men ; their affairs as righteous : 
But all hoods make not monks. Hen. VIII. 3; 1. 

'Tis sin to flatter, good was little better, 
Good Gloster and good devil were alike, 
And both preposterous. 777 Hen. VI. 5: 6. 

Apparel vice like virtues harbinger: 

Bear a fair presence, though your heart be tainted; 

Teach sin the carriage of a holy saint; 

Be secret-false. Com. of Err. 3:2. 

Seems he a dove? his feathers are but borrow'd, 

For he's disposed as the hateful raven. 

Is he a lamb? his skin is surely lent him, 

For he's inclin'd as is the ravenous wolf, 

Who cannot steal a shape, that means deceit? II Hen. VI. 3:1. 

The world is still deceiv'd with ornament, 

In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt, 

But, being season'd with a gracious voice, 

Obscures the show of evil? In religion, 

What damned error, but some sober brow 

Will bless it, and approve it with a text, 

Hiding the grossness with fair ornament ? 

There is no vice so simple, but assumes 

Some mark of virtue on his outward parts. Mer. of Ven. 3: 2. 

He was a man 
Of an unbounded stomach, ever ranking 
Himself with princes ; one, that by suggestion 
Tied all the kingdom : simony was fair play : 
His own opinion was his law : i' the presence 
He would say untruths, and be ever double, 
Both in his words and meaning. He was never, 
But where he meant to ruin, pitiful : 
His promises were, as he then was, mighty : 
But his performance, as he is now, nothing. 
Of his own body he was ill, and gave 
The clergy ill example. Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 



144 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Why this is the world's soul; 

And just of the same piece 

Is every flatterer's sport: who can call him his friend 

That dips in the same dish? Timon 3:2. 

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose. 

An evil soul, producing holy witness, 

Is like a villain with a smiling cheek, 

A goodly apple rotten at the heart. 

O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath ! Mer. of Ven. 1: 3. 

Divinity of hell ! 
When devils will their blackest sins put on, 
They do suggest at first with heavenly shows, 
As I do now; . . . 
So will I turn her virtue into pitch, 
And out of her own goodness make the net, 
That shall enmesh them all. Othello 2:3. 

Sweet prince, the untainted virtue of your years 

Hath not yet div'd into the world's deceit: 

No more can you distinguish of a man, 

Than of his outward show ; which, God he knows, 

Seldom, or never, jumpeth with the heart. 

Those uncles, which you want, were dangerous; 

Your grace attended to their sugar'd words, 

But look'd not on the poison of their hearts : 

God keep you from them, and from such false friends ! 

Rich. III. 3: 1. 

Think'st thou I'll endanger my soul gratis? 

... I myself sometimes, leaving the fear of Heaven on the left 
hand, and hiding mine honor in my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to 
hedge, and to lurch. Merry Wives 2: 2. 

The devil knew not what he did, when he made man politic: he 
crossed himself by't ; and I cannot think, but, in the end, the villainies 
of man will set him clear. How fairly this lord strives to appear foul ? 
takes virtuous copies to be wicked ; like those that, under hot ardent 
zeal, would set whole realms on fire. Of such a nature is his politic 
love. Timon. 3:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 145 

O serpent heart, hid with a flowering face ! 
Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave? 
Beautiful tyrant; fiend angelical! 
Dove-feather'd raven ! wolvish-ravening lamb ! 
Despised substance of divinest show! 
Just opposite to what thou justly seem'st ; 
A damned saint, an honorable villain ! — 
O, nature ! what hadst thou to do in hell, 
When thou didst pour the spirit of a fiend 
In mortal paradise of such sweet flesh? — 
Was ever book containing such vile matter, 
So fairly bound? O, that deceit should dwell 
In such a gorgeous palace! . . There's no trust, 
No faith, no honesty in men ; all perjur'd, 
All forsworn, all naught, all dissemblers. — Rom. and Jul. 5: 2. 



FORGIVENESS— PARDON 

God forgive the sin of all those souls. King John 2: 1. 

If there be any such, Heaven pardon him ! Othello 4: 2. 

O God ! forgive my sins, and pardon thee ! 777 Hen. VI. 5: 6. 

God forgive them that so much have sway'd. I Hen. IV. 5: 2. 

Who by repentance is not satisfied 
Is not of Heaven. Two Gent. 5: 4. 

More needs she the divine than the physician, 
God, God ; forgive us all ! Macb. 5: 1. 

Lady, you know no rules of charity, 

Which renders good for bad, blessings for cursings. 

Rich III. 1:2. 

God pardon him ! I do with' all my heart ; 
And yet no man, like he, doth grieve my heart. 

Rom. and Jul. 5:5. 
10 



146 ' SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

I do think that you might pardon him 

And neither Heaven, nor man, grieve at the mercy. 

Me as. for Me as. 2: 2. 

Ignomy in ransom, and free pardon, 

Are of two houses: lawful mercy 

Is nothing kin to foul redemption. Meas. for Meas. 2: 4. 

Forgive me my foul murder! — 
That cannot be; since I am still possess'd 
Of those effects for which I did the murder. 
. . . May one be pardon'd, and retain the offence? Ham. 3: 3. 

Well Heaven forgive him! and forgive us all: 

Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall : 

Some run from brakes of ice, and answer none; 

And some condemned for a fault alone. Meas. for Meas. 2: 1. 

Are you so gospell'd 
To pray for this good man, and for his issue, 
Whose heavy hand hath bow'd you to the grave, 
And beggar 'd yours forever? Macb. 3:1. 

God be thanked for prevention; 
Which I in sufferance heartily will rejoice, 
Beseeching God, and you, to pardon me. . . . 
God quit you in His mercy! Hen. V. 2:2. 

I as free forgive you, 
As I would be forgiven: I forgive all: 
There cannot be those numberless offenses 
'Gainst me, that I cannot take peace with : no black envy 
Shall make my grave. Commend me to his grace ; 
And, if he speak of Buckingham, pray, tell him, 
You met him half in heaven. My vows and prayers 
Yet are the king's; and, till my soul forsake, 
Shall cry for blessings on him: may he live 
Longer than I have time to tell his years. 
Ever belov'd, and loving, may his rule be : 
And when old time shall lead him to his end, 
Goodness and he fill up one monument ! Hen. VIII. 2: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE H7 

Duch. A virtuous and Christianlike conclusion, 

To pray for them that have done scath to us. Rich. III. i: 3. 

I rather do beseech you pardon me, 

Who, earnest in the service of my God, 

Neglect the visitation of my friends. Rich. III. 5: 7. 

An if I were thy nurse, thy tongue to teach, 
Pardon should be the first word of thy speech. 
I never long'd to hear a word till now ; 
Say — pardon, king; let pity teach thee how: 
The word is short, but not so short as sweet; 
No word like pardon, for king's mouths so meet. 

Dost thou teach pardon pardon to destroy? 
Ah, my sour husband, my hard-hearted lord, 
That sett'st the word itself against the word ! 
Speak, pardon, as 'tis current in our land; 
Thine eye begins to speak, set thy tongue there, 
Or in thy piteous heart plant thou thine ear ; 
That hearing how our plaints and prayers do pierce, 
Pity may move thee pardon to rehearse. 

I do not sue to stand 

Pardon is all the suit I have in hand. 

Boling. I pardon him, as God shall pardon me. 

Duch. O, happy vantage of a kneeling knee ! 
Yet am I sick for fear: speak it again; 
Twice saying pardon doth not pardon twain, 
But makes one pardon strong. Rich. II. 5:5. 



143 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

GOD'S ATTRIBUTES 
By Him that made me. / Hen. VI. 2: 4. 
By Him that made us all. 777 Hen. VI. 2:2. 
Great God ! how just art Thou. II Hen. VI. 5: 1. 
This lies all within the will of God. Hen. V. 1:2. 
So just is God, to right the innocent. Rich. III. 1:3. 
O, upright, just and true-disposing God. Rich. III. 4: 4. 
Mercy ... is an attribute to God himself. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 
Eternal Mover of the heavens. (See Death.) II Hen. VI. 3:3. 
Or that the Everlasting had not fixed. (See Suicide.) Ham. 1:2. 
It is not so with Him that all things knows. All's Well 2: 1. 



By the eternal God, whose name and power 
Thou tremblest at. II Hen. VI. 1: 4. 

A greater Power than we can contradict 

Hath thwarted our designs. Rom. and Jul. 5:3. 

God omnipotent 
Is mustering in his clouds, on our behalf. Rich. II. 3:3. 

If powers divine 
Behold our human actions, as they do. Winter's Tale 3: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 149 

GOD OUR DEFENCE AND HELP 

In the great hand of God I stand. Macb. 2: 3. 

God befriend us, as our cause is just. I Hen. IV. 5: 1. 

God on our side, doubt not of victory. 77 Hen. VI. 4: 8. 

God and his angels guard your sacred throne. Hen. V. 1:2. 

We are in God's hands brother, not in their's. Hen. V. 3:6. 

The Lord protect him, for he's a good man! 
Jesu, bless him! 77 Hen. VI. 1:3. 

Arm, arm you heavens, against these perjur'd kings 
A widow cries; be husband to me. King John 3: 1. 

O God, thy arm was here, 
And not to us, but to thy arm alone, 
Ascribe we all. Hen. V. 4: 8. 

The breath of worldly men cannot depose 

The deputy elected by the Lord. Rich. II. 3:2. 

But as we, under Heaven are supreme head, 

So, under Him, that great supremacy. King John 3: 1. 

All places that the eye of heaven visits 

Are to a wise man ports and happy havens. Rich. II. 1:3. 

Let us be back'd with God, and with the seas, 

Which he hath given for fence impregnable. 77/ Hen. VI. 4: 1. 

God knows how long it is I have to live 

And it hath pleas'd him that three times to-day 

You have defended me from imminent death. 77 Hen. VI. 5; 3. 

Thou God of this vast, rebuke these surges, 

Which wash both heaven and hell: and thou that hast 

Upon the winds command, bind them in brass. Pericles 3: 1. 



150 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

GOD OUR TRUST— NOT MAN 

Give your cause to Heaven. Meas. for Meas. 4: 3. 

Praised be God, and not our strength, for it ! Hen. V. 4: 7. 

O, momentary grace of mortal man 

Which we more hunt for than the grace of God. Rich. III. 3:4. 

There is your crown: 
And he that wears the crown immortally, 
Long guard it yours! 77 Hen. IV. 4: 4. 

O Cromwell, Cromwell, 
Had I but serv'd my God with half the zeal 
I served my king, He would not in mine age 
Have left me naked to mine enemies. Hen. VIII. 3:4. 

It is not so with Him that all things knows, 

As 'tis with us that square our guess by shows ; 

But most it is presumption in us, when 

The help of Heaven we count the act of men. All's Well 2: 1. 

GOLD— MONEY (See Wealth) 

" All that glisters is not gold." Mer. of Ven. 2: 7. 

All gold and silver rather turn to dirt ! 
As 'tis no better reckoned, but of those 
Who worship dirty gods. Cymb. 3:6. 

Plate "sin with gold, 
And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks: 
Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it. King Lear 4: 6. 

There is thy gold; worse poison to men's souls, 

Doing more murder in this loathsome world, 

Than these poor compounds that thou may'st not sell: 

I sell thee poison, thou hast sold me none. Rom. and Jul. 5: 1. 



SCRIPTURE 7 'HEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 151 

Know'st thou not any whom corrupting gold 

Would tempt unto a close exploit of death? . . . 

Gold were as good as twenty orators 

And will no doubt tempt him to anything. Rich. III. 4: 2. 

Tis gold 
Which buys admittance : oft it doth ; yea, and makes 
Diana's rangers false themselves, yield up 
Their deer to the stand o' the stealer; and 'tis gold 
Which makes the true man kill'd, and saves the thief; 
Nay, sometimes hangs both thief and true man: what 
Can it not do, and undo? Cymb. 2: 3. 

Though you, and all the kings of Christendom, 
Are led so grossly by this meddling priest, 
Dreading the curse that money may buy out, 
And, by the merit of vile gold, dross, dust, 
Purchase corrupted pardon of a man, 
Who, in that sale, sells pardon from himself; 
Though you, and all the rest, so grossly led, 
This juggling witchcraft with revenue cherish ; 
Yet I, alone, alone do me oppose 
Against the pope, and count his friends my foes. 

King lohn 5: 1. 
What is here? 
Gold? yellow, glittering, precious gold? 
. . . Much of this will make 
Black, white; foul, fair; wrong, right; 
Base, noble; old, young; coward, valiant. 

. . . Why this 
Will buy your priests and servants from your sides; 
Pluck stout men's pillows from below their heads: 
This yellow slave 

Will knit and break religions; bless the accurs'd; 
Make the hoar leprosy ador'd ; place thieves, 
And give them title, knee, and approbation 
With senators on the bench. Timon. 4: j. 



152 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

GRACE BEFORE MEAT 

Your soldiers use him as the grace 'fore meat 
Their talk at table, and their thanks at end. Corio. 4: 7. 

Grace thou wilt have none, — 
No, by my troth; not so much as will serve to be a prologue to 
an egg and butter. I Hen. IV. 1: 2. 

Will you give thanks, sweet Kate, or else shall I ? 

Tarn, of Shrew 4: 1. 

While grace is saying, hood mine eyes 
Thus with my hat, and sigh and say. amen. (See Hypocrisy.) 

Mer. of Ven. 2: 2. 

1 Gent. There's not a soldier of us that, in the thanksgiving before 
meat, doth relish the petition well that prays for peace. 

2 Gent. I never heard any soldier dislike it. 

Lucio. I believe thee; for I think thou never wast where grace 
was said. 

2 Gent. No? A dozen times at least. 

1 Gent. What? in metre? 

Lucio. In any proportion, or in any language. 

Me as. for Meas. 1:2. 



GRATITUDE— INGRATITUDE 

Ingratitude! thou marble-hearted fiend. King Lear 1:4. 

Ingratitude, more strong than traitor's arms. Jul. Caesar 3:2. 

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is 
To have a thankless child. King Lear 1. 4. 

O Lord, that lends me life, 

Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness ! 77 Hen. VI. 1: 1. 

Filial ingratitude ! 
Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand, 
For lifting food to 't? King Lear 3: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 153 

I hate ingratitude more in a man 

Than lying, vainness, babbling, drunkenness, 

Or any taint of vice. Twelfth Night 3:4. 

Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back, 

Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, 

A great-sized monster of ingratitude; 

Those scraps are good deeds past: which are devour'd 

As fast as they are made, forgot as soon 

As done. Troi. and Cres. 3:3. 

The sin of my ingratitude even now 

Was heavy on me : thou 'rt so far before, 

That swiftest wing of recompense is slow 

To overtake thee. Would thou hadst less deserved, 

That the proportion both of thanks and payment 

Might have been mine. Macb. 1: 4. 

God is much displeased 
That you take with unthankfulness his doing; 
In common worldly things 'tis called ungrateful, 
With dull unwillingness to repay a debt, 
Which with bounteous hand was kindly lent; 
Much more to be thus opposite with Heaven, 
For it requires the royal debt it lent you. Rich. HI. 2: 2 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind, 
Thou art not so unkind 

As man's ingratitude ; 
Thy tooth is not so keen, 
Because thou art not seen, 

Although thy breath be rude. 

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, 
Thou dost not bite so nigh 

As benefits forgot: 
Though thou the waters warp, 
Thy sting is not so sharp 

As friend remember'd not. 

Song in As You Like It 2: 7. 

Ingratitude is monstrous : and for the multitude to be ungrateful were 
to make a monster of the multitude. Corio. 2:3. 



154 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

HEAVEN 

all you host of heaven! Ham. i: 5. 

He wisheth you in heaven. (See Hell.) / Hen. IV. 3:1. 

There's husbandry in heaven, 
Their candles are all out. Macb. 2: 1. 

My name be blotted from the book of life, 
And I from heaven banished. Rich. I. 1:3. 

He wants nothing of a god but 

Eternity, and a heaven to throne in. Corio. 5: 4. 

There are more things in heaven and earth. — 
Than are dreamt of in our philosophy. Ham. 1:5. 

My soul shall thine keep company to heaven; 

Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly abreast. Hen. V. 4:6. 

I here protest ; in sight of Heaven, 
And by the hope I have of heavenly bliss. ///. Hen. VI. 3: 3. 

The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, 

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven. 

Mid. Dream 3: 1. 

My husband is on earth, my faith in heaven ; 

How shall that faith return again to earth, 

Unless that husband send it me from heaven ? Rom. and Jul. 3 : 5. 

Fare you well; 
Hereafter, in a better world than this 

1 shall desire more love and knowledge of you. As You Like It 1: 2. 

Yet that thy brazen gates of Heaven may ope, 

And give sweet passage to my sinful soul 

Now lords, take leave, until we meet again 

Where e'er it be, in Heaven, or on earth. /// Hen. VI. 2: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 155 

From this earth's thraldom to the joys of heaven. Rich. III. 1: 4. 

Heaven's above all ; and there be souls must be saved, and there be 
souls must not be saved. Othello 2: 3. 

Would I were with him, either in heaven, or in hell ! 
Nay, sure, he's in Arthur's 1 bosom, if ever man went to Arthur's 
bosom. Hen. V. 2: 3. 

I know his soul is in heaven, fool. 

The more fool, Madonna, to mourn for your brother's soul being in 
heaven. Twelfth Night 1:5. 

HEAVEN, RECOGNITION IN 

When I am in heaven, I shall desire 
To see what this child does, and praise my Maker. Hen. VIII. 5: 4. 

Warwick bids 
You all farewell, to meet again in heaven. 7/7. Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

So part we sadly in this troublous world, 

To meet with joy in sweet Jerusalem. III. Hen. VI. 5: 5. 

God be wi' you princes all : I'll to my charge : 
If we no more meet till we meet in heaven, 
Then, joyfully. Hen. V. 4:3. 

Father Cardinal, I have heard you say, 

That we shall see and know our friends in heaven: 

If that be true, I shall see my boy again; .... 

And so he'll die; and, rising so again, 

When I shall meet him in the court of heaven 

I shall not know him. King lohn 5: 4. 

1 Abraham's bosom. 



156 SCRIPTURE, THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

HELL 

As black as hell, as dark as night. Sonnet 14/. 

'Tis the cunning livery of hell. Meas. for Meas. 5; 1. 

By hell, and all hell's torments. Troi. and Cres. 5: 2. 

Am I in earth, in heaven, or in hell? Com. of Err. 2: 2. 

The fires i' the lowest hell fold in the people. Corio. 3: 3. 

Such devils steal effects from lightless hell. Lucrece St. 223. 

I think his soul is in hell. (See Heaven.) Twelfth Night 1: 5. 

Thou cam'st on earth to make the earth my hell. Rich. III. 4: 4. 

One sees more devils than vast hell can hold. Mid. Dream 5: 1. 

If the bottom were as deep as hell I should drown. 

Merry Wives 3: 5. 

I would it were hell-pains for thy sake, and my poor doing eternal. 

All's Well 2: 3. 

Hell is empty, 
And all the devils are here. Tempest 1: 2. 

. . . Yet none knows well 
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell. Sonnet 129. 

I am damned in hell for swearing . . . 

. . . Think'st thou I'll endanger my soul gratis? Merry Wives 2: 2. 

If there be devils, would I were a devil, 

To live and burn in everlasting fire, 

So I might have your company in hell 

But to torment you with my bitter tongue ! Titus And. 5: 7. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 157 

No: though thou call'st thyself a hotter name 
Than any is in hell. Macb. 5: 7. 

Sin, death and hell have set their marks on him 

And all their ministers attend on him. Rich. III. 1:3. 

then, what graces in my love do dwell, 

That he hath turn'd a heaven into a hell. Mid. Dream 1: 1. 

1 think this Talbot be a fiend of hell. 

If not of hell, the heavens sure favor him. I Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

Down, down, to hell ; and say I sent thee thither 

I, that have neither pity, love, nor fear. 77/ Hen. VI. 5:6. 

Foul devil, for God's sake, hence and trouble us not ; 

For thou hast made the happy earth thy hell. Rich. III. 1: 2. 

And as I thrust thy body in with my sword, 

So wish I, I might thrust thy soul to hell. II Hen. VI. 4: 10. 

And be my heart an ever-burning hell, 

These miseries are more than may be borne. Titus And. 3: 1. 

But purgatory, torture, hell itself . . . banished? 

friar, the damned use that word in hell. Rom. and Jul. 3: 3. 

And that deep torture may be call'd a hell 

When more is felt than one hath power to tell. Lucrece St. 184. 

Fare thee well ; 
A fiend like thee might bear my soul to hell. Twelfth Night 3: 4. 

Black is the badge of hell, 
The hue of dungeons, and the scowl of night. Love's Labor 4: 3. 

1 will stir up in England some black storm. 

Shall blow ten thousand souls to heaven or hell. II Hen. VI. 3: 1. 

Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn'd 

Bring with thee airs from heaven, or blasts from hell! Ham. 1: 4. 



158 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

O, if men were to be saved by merit, what hole in hell were hot enough 
for him? / Hen. IV. 1:2. 

If I would not have taken him at a word, I would I might go to Hell 
among the rogues. Jul. Caesar 1:2. 

I think the devil will not have me damned, lest the oil that is in me 
should set hell on fire. Merry Wives 5: 5. 

I never see thy face, but I think upon hell-fire, and Dives that lived in 
purple ; for there he is in his robes, burning, burning. 

I Hen. IV. 3:3. 
False as hell. . . . you 

That have the office opposite to Saint Peter, 
And keep the gate of hell. Othello 4: 2. 

Not in the legions 
Of horrid hell, can come a devil more damn'd 
In evils, to top Macbeth. . . . 

Had I power, I should 
Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell, 
Uproar the universal peace, confound 
All unity on earth. Macb. 4:3. 

Hell and night 
Must bring this monstrous birth to the world's light. 



As low as hell's from heaven. Othello 1:3 and 2: 1. 

No, he is in Tartar limbo, worse than hell 

A devil in an everlasting garment hath him ; 

One whose hard heart is button'd up with steel ; . . . 

One that, before judgment, carries poor souls to hell. 

Com. of Brr. 4: 2. 

This outward-sainted deputy 
... is yet a devil; 
His filth within being cast, he would appear 
A pond as deep as hell. . . . 
O, 'tis the cunning livery of hell, 
The damned'st body to invest and cover 
In precise guards. Meas. for Me as. 3: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 159 

Go thou and fill another room in hell. 

That hand shall burn in never-quenching fire, 

That staggers thus my person. Rich. II. 5: 5. 

I cannot tell 
What heaven hath given him : let some graver eye 
Pierce into that ; but I can see his pride 
Peep through each part of him : whence has he that ? 
If not from hell, the devil is a niggard ; 
Or has given all before, and he begins 
A new hell in himself. Hen. VIII. 1: 1. 

To win me soon to hell, my female evil 

Tempteth my better angel from my side, 

And would corrupt my saint to be a devil, 

Wooing his purity with her foul pride. 

And whether that my angel be turn'd fiend, 

Suspect I may, yet not directly tell ; 

But being both from me, both to each friend, 

I guess one angel in another's hell: 

Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt, 

Till my bad angel fire my good one out. Sonnet 144. 

Porter. Here's a knocking, indeed ! If a man were porter of hell- 
gate, he should have old turning the key. [Knocking.'] Knock, knock, 
knock : Who's there, i' the name of Belzebub ? — Here's a farmer, that 
hanged himself on the expectation of plenty : come in time ; have nap- 
kins enough about you; here you'll sweat for't. [Knocking.'] Knock, 
knock: Who's there, in the other devil's name? — 'Faith, here's an 
equivocator, that could swear in both the scales against either scale; 
who committed treason enough for God's sake, yet could not equivocate 
to heaven: O! come in, equivocator. [Knocking.] Knock, knock, 
knock : Who's there ? — 'Faith, here's an English tailor come hither for 
stealing out of a French hose : come in, tailor ; here you may roast your 
goose. [Knocking.] Knock, knock: Never at quiet ! What are you? 
— But this place is too cold for hell. I'll devil-porter it no farther: I 
had thought to have let in some of all professions, that go the primrose 
way to the everlasting bonfire. Macb. 2: 3. 



160 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

HYPOCRISY— INSINCERITY (See Falsehood) 

False face must hide what the false heart doth know. Macb. i: /. 

Ye have angel's faces, but heaven knows your hearts. Hen. VIII. 3: I. 

How holily he works in all his business ! Hen. VIII. 2: 2. 

Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth. Ham. 2: 1. 

O, what authority and show of truth 

Can cunning sin cover itself withal ! Much Ado 4: 1. 

'Tis too much prov'd, that, with devotion's visage, 
And pious actions, we do sugar o'er 
The devil himself. Ham. 3: J. 

Would it not grieve an able man, to leave 

So sweet a bedfellow ? But conscience, conscience, — 

O, 'tis a tender place, and I must leave her. Hen. VIII. 2: 2. 

Did they not sometimes cry, All hail ! to me 

So Judas did to Christ ; but he in twelve 

Found truth in all but one ; I, in twelve thousand none. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another ; you 
jig, you amble, and you lisp, and nickname God's creatures, and make 
your wantonness your ignorance. Ham. 3: 1. 

Look like the time, bear welcome in your eye, 
Your hand, your tongue : look like the innocent flower, 
But be the serpent under't. He that's coming 
Must be provided for. Macb. 1:5. 

If I do not put on a sober habit, 

Talk with respect, and swear but now and then, 

Wear prayer-books in my pocket, look demurely; 

Nay more, while grace is saying, hood mine eyes 

Thus with my hat, and sigh, and say amen ; 

. . . never trust me more. Mer. of Ven. 2: 2 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 161 

And that I love the tree from whence thou sprang'st. 

Witness the loving kiss I give the fruit : — 

To say the truth, so Judas kissed his Master 

And cried, All hail ! when he meant — all harm. Hen. VI. $: 7. 

Now the bishop 
Turns insurrection to religion: 
Suppos'd sincere and holy in his thoughts, 
He's follow'd both with body and with mind. // Hen. IV. 1: I. 

Thou concludest like the sanctimonious pirate, that went to sea with 
the ten commandments but scraped one out of the table. 
Thou shalt not steal ? 
Ay, that he razed. Meas. for Meas. 1: 2. 

Trust not those cunning waters of his eyes. 

For villainy is not without such rheum ; 

And he, long traded in it, makes it seem 

Like rivers of remorse and innocency. King lohn 4: 3. 

Though some of you, with Pilate, wash your hands, 

Showing an outward pity ; yet you Pilates 

Have here delivered me to my sour cross 

And water cannot wash away your sin. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

How courtesy would seem to cover sin ! 
When what is done is like an hypocrite 

The which is good in nothing but in sight 

'Tis time to fear when tyrants seem to kiss. Pericles 1: 1 and 1:3. 

Pleads he in earnest ? look upon his face ; 
His eyes do drop no tears, his prayers are in jest ; 
His words come from his mouth, ours from our breast : 
He prays but faintly, and would be denied ; 
We pray with heart, and soul, and all beside : 
His weary joints would gladly rise, I know; 
Our knees shall kneel till to the ground they grow : 
His prayers are full of false hypocrisy; 
Ours of true zeal and deep integrity. 
Our prayers do out-pray his ; then, let them have 
That mercy which true prayers ought to have. Rich. II. 5: 3. 
11 



162 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

And look you, get a prayer-book in your hand, 

And stand between two churchmen, good my lord ; 

For on that ground I'll make a holy descent: 

And be not easily won to our requests ; 

Play the maid's part, still answer nay, and take it. Rich. III. 3: ?. 

There are no tricks in plain and simple faith ; 
But hollow men, like horses hot at hand, 
Make gallant show and promise of their mettle, 
But when they should endure the bloody spur, 
They fall their crests, and, like deceitful jades, 
Sink in the trial. Jul. Caesar 4: 2. 

O perilous mouths ! 
That bear in them one and the selfsame tongue 
Either of condemnation or reproof; 
Bidding the law make courtesy to their will ; 
Hooking both right and wrong to the appetite, 
To follow as it draws ! Meas. for Meas. 2: 4. 

O place ! O form ! 
How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit, 
Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls 
To thy false seeming ! Blood, thou art blood ! 
Let's write good angel on the devil's horn, 
'Tis not the devil's crest. Meas. for Meas. 2: 4. 

I took him for the plainest harmless't creature 

That breath'd upon the earth a Christian; 

Made him my book, wherein my soul recorded 

The history of all her secret thoughts: 

So smooth he daub'd his vice with show of virtue : — . . « 

He liv'd from all attainder of suspects. Rich. III. 3: 5. 

The secret mischiefs that I set abroach, 

I lay unto the grievous charge of others 

But then I sigh, and, with a piece of Scripture, 

Tell them, that God bids us do good for evil : 

And thus I clothe my naked villainy 

With odd old ends stol'n forth of holy writ, 

And seem a saint when most I play the devil. Rich. III. 1:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 163 

But, like a constant and confirmed devil, 

He entertain'd a show so seeming just, 

And therein so ensconc'd his secret evil, 

That jealousy itself could not mistrust, 

False-creeping craft and perjury should thrust 
Into so bright a day such black-fac'd storms, 
Or blot with hell-born sin such saint-like forms. 

Lucrece, St. 217. 

I am a simple woman, much too weak 

To oppose your cunning. You are meek and humble-mouth'd ; 

You sign your place and calling in full seeming, 

With meekness and humility; but your heart 

Is cramm'd with arrogancy, spleen, and pride. 

You have, by fortune and his highness' favors, 

Gone slightly o'er low steps, and now are mounted 

Where powers are your retainers ; and your words 

Domestics to you, serve your will, as 't please 

Yourself pronounce their office. I must tell you, 

You tender more your person's honor, than 

Your high profession spiritual. Hen. VIII. 2: 4. 

O prince, I conjure thee, as thou believ'st 
There is another comfort than this world, 
That thou neglect me not, with that opinion 
That I am touch' d with madness : make not impossible 
That which but seems unlike. 'Tis not impossible, 
But one, the wicked'st caitiff on the ground, 
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute, 
As Angelo ; even so may Angelo, 
In all his dressings, characts, titles, forms, 
Be an arch-villain. Believe it, royal prince. 
If he be less, he's nothing; but he's more, 
Had I more name for badness. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 



i6 4 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 



IGNORANCE— PRIDE 

Ignorance is the curse of God, 

Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven. // Hen. VI. 4: 7. 

We, ignorant of ourselves, 

Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers 

Deny us for our good. Ant. and Cleo. 2: 1. 

The eagle-winged pride 
Of sky-aspiring and ambitious thoughts 
With rival-hating envy. Rich. II. 1 : 3. 

... I can see his pride 

Peep through each part of him: whence has he that? 

If not from hell, the devil is a niggard : 

Or has given all before, and he begins 

A new hell in himself. Hen. VIII. 1: 1. 

There is no darkness but ignorance; in which thou art more puzzled 

than the Egyptians in their fog. 
I say, this house is dark as ignorance, though ignorance were as dark 

as hell. Twelfth Night 4: 2. 

The common curse of mankind, folly and ignorance, be thine in great 
revenue ! heaven bless thee from a tutor, and discipline come not 
near thee ! . . . 

What, art thou devout? wast thou in a prayer? Troi. and Cres. 2:3. 

Why should a man be proud? How doth pride grow? I know not 
what pride is. . . . He that is proud eats up himself ; pride is his own 
glass, his own trumpet, his own chronicle, and whatever praises itself 
but in the deed, devours the deed in the praise. Troi and Cres. 2: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 165 

INNOCENCE 

The trust I have is in mine innocence. II Hen. VI. 4: 4. 

Unstained thoughts do seldom dream on evil. Lucrece, St. 13. 

The silence often of pure innocence 

Persuades, when speaking fails. Winter's Tale 2: 2. 

Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell : 
Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace, 
Yet grace must still look so. 1 Macb. 4: 3. 

... A thousand innocent shames 

In angel whiteness bear away those blushes; 

. . . trust not my age 
My reverence, calling, nor divinity, 
If this sweet lady lie not guiltless here 
Under some biting error. Much Ado 4: 1. 

We were as twinn'd lambs, that did frisk 'i the sun 

And bleat the one at the other: what we changed 

Was innocence for innocence; we knew not 

The doctrine of ill-doing, nor dream'd 

That any did: had we pursued that life, 

And our weak spirits ne'er been higher rear'd 

With stronger blood we should have answer'd Heaven 

Boldly, "Not Guilty." Winter's Tale 1: 2. 

... If powers divine 
Behold our human actions, as they do, 
I doubt not then but innocence shall make 
False accusations blush, and tyranny 

Tremble at patience For life, I prize it, 

As I weigh grief, which I would spare: for honor 

'Tis a derivative from me to mine, 

And one that I stand for. I appeal 

To your own conscience. Winter's Tale 3: 2. 

2 That is, though all bad things should counterfeit the looks of goodness, yet 
goodness must still wear its own looks. Hudson's Notes. 



i66 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

JESUS— CHRIST— SAVIOUR 

So Judas did to Christ. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Jesu maintain your royal excellence. II Hen. VI 1: 1. 

The precious image of our dear Redeemer. Rich. III. 2: 1. 

Through all the kingdoms that acknowledge Christ. / Hen. IV. 5: 2. 

I every day expect an embassage 

From my Redeemer to redeem me hence. Rich. III. 2: 1. 

Some say, that ever 'gainst that season comes 
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated. Ham. 1: 1. 

The dread King that took our state upon Him 

To free us from His Father's wrathful curse. II Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

Your Master, 
Whose minister you are, whiles here he lived 
Upon this naughty earth. Hen. VIII. 5: 1. 

As far as to the sepulchre of Christ, 

Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross, 

We are impressed and engag'd to fight. 

.... In those holy fields, 
Over whose acres walk'd those blessed feet, 
Which fourteen hundred years ago were nail'd 
For our advantage, on the bitter cross. / Hen. IV. 1: 1. 

Many a time hath banish'd Norfolk fought 
For Jesu Christ in glorious Christian field, 
Streaming the ensign of the Christian cross. 

. . And there, at Venice, gave 
His body to that pleasant country's earth, 
And his pure soul unto his captain Christ, 
Under whose colors he had fought so long. Rich. II. 4: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 167 

JUDGMENT 

Heaven forgive my sins at the day of Judgment. Merry Wives 3:3. 

Then, dreadful trumpet, sound the general doom. Rom. and Jul. 3: 2. 

No reckoning made, but sent to my account 

With all my imperfections on my head. Ham. 1: 5. 

The dreadful judgment day 
So dreadful will not be, as was his sight. / Hen. VI. 1: 1. 

God grant me too, 
Thou may'st be damned for that wicked deed! Rich. III. 1:2. 

Foul deeds will rise, 
Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes. Ham. 1: 2. 

O judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts 

And men have lost their reason. Jul. Caesar 3: 2. 

Which if we should deny, the most just God, 

For every graft would send a caterpillar. Pericles 5." 1. 

Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit, 
And look on death itself ! Up, up, and see 
The great doom's image. Macb. 2: 3. 

How would you be, 
If He, which is at the top of judgment, should 
But judge you as you are? Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

O, when the last account 'twixt heaven and earth 
Is to be made, then shall this hand and seal 
Witness against us to damnation. King John 4: 2. 

Take heed you dally not before your king ; 
Lest He that is the supreme King of kings 
Confound your hidden falsehood, and award 
Either of you to be the other's end. Rich. III. 2: 1. 



168 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

O Thou that judgest all things, stay my thoughts; .... 

... If my suspect be false, forgive me, God ; 

For judgment only doth belong to Thee. II Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

If these men have defeated the law, and outrun native punishment, 
though they can outstrip men they have no wings to fly from 
God. (See Responsibility.) Hen. V. 4:1. 

Why, he shall never wake until the great judgment day. . . . 
. . . The urging of that word, judgment, hath bred a kind of 
remorse in me. Rich. III. 1: 4. 



From that supernal judge that stirs good thoughts 

In any breast of strong authority 

To look into the blots and stains of right. 

That judge hath made me guardian to this boy. 

Alter not the doom 

Fore-thought by heaven. King John 2: 1 and 3: /. 

O let the vile world end ! 
And the premis'd flames of the last day 
Knit earth and heaven together ! 
Now let the general trumpet blow his blast, 
Particularities and petty sounds 
To cease! II Hen. VI. 5:2. 

Why, then All-Souls' day is my body's doomsday. 
This is the day, which, in king Edward's time, 
I wish'd might fall on me, when I was found 
False to his children, or his wife's allies : 
This is the day, wherein I wish'd to fall 
By the false faith of him whom most I trusted : 
This, this All-Souls' day to my fearful soul 
Is the determin'd respite of my wrongs. 
That high All-Seer, which I dallied with, 
Hath turn'd my feign'd prayer on my head, 
And given in earnest what I begg'd in jest. 
Thus doth he force the swords of wicked men 
To turn their own points in their masters' bosoms. 

Rich. III. 5: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 169 

... if the assassination 
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch 
With his surcease success ; that but this blow 
Might be the be-all and the end-all here, 
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, 
We'd jump the life to come. — But in these cases, 
We still have judgment here ; that we but teach 
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return 
To plague th' inventor : this even-handed justice 
Commends th' ingredients of our poison'd chalice 
To our own lips. He's here in double trust : 
First, as I am his kinsman and his subject; 
Strong both against the deed : then, as his host, 
Who should against his murderer shut the door, 
Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan 
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
Will plead, like angels, trumpet-tongued, against 
The deep damnation of his taking-off. Macb. 1: 7. 



JUSTICE— INJUSTICE 

Justice always whirls in equal measure. Love's Labor 4: 3. 

Measure for measure must be answered. 77/ Hen. VI. 2: 6 

Like doth quit like, and measure still for measure. 

Meas. for Me as. 5: 1. 

God, not we, hath plagued thy bloody deed. 

So just is God, to right the innocent. Rich. III. 1: 5. 

My comfort is that heaven will take our souls 

And plague injustice with the pains of hell. Rich. II. 3: 1. 

O God ! I fear thy justice will take hold 

On me, and you, and mine, and yours, for this. Rich. III. 2: 1. 

Arm, arm, you heavens, against these perjur'd kings 

A widow cries ; be husband to me, heavens ! King John 3: 1. 



170 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

If Angels fight, 
Weak men must fall ; for Heaven still guards the right. 

Rich. II. 3: 2. 

Condemn the fault but not the actor of it ? 
Why, every fault's condemn'd ere it be done. 

Meas. for Me as. 2: 2. 

Poise the cause in justice equal scales, 

Whose beam stands sure, whose rightful cause prevails. 

// Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

For though usurpers sway the rule awhile, 

Yet Heavens are just, and time suppresseth wrongs. 

Ill Hen. VI. 3: 3. 

Is this your Christian counsel ? Out upon ye ! 
Heaven is above all yet: there sits a judge 
That no king can corrupt. Hen. VIII. 3: 1. 

Falseness cannot come from thee, for thou look'st 
Modest as Justice, and thou seem'st a palace 
For the crown'd Truth to dwell in. Pericles 5: /. 

. . . This shows that you are above, 
You justicers, that these our nether crimes 
So speedily can venge ! King Lear 4: 2. 

. . . And yet but justice ; for though 

This king were great, his greatness was no guard 

To bar heaven's shaft, but sin had his reward. Pericles 2: 4. 

I do beseech your lordships, 
That, in this case of justice, my accusers, 
Be what they will, may stand forth face to face, 
And freely urge against me. Hen. VIII. 5: 2. 

He who the sword of Heaven will bear, 

Should be as holy as severe ; 

Pattern in himself, to know, 

Grace to stand, and virtue go. Meas. for Meas. 3: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 171 

I show it (pity) most of all, when I show justice; 

For then I pity those I do not know ; 

Which a dismiss'd offence would after gall. Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

Thrice is he arm'd that hath his quarrel just; 

And he but naked, though locked up in steel, 

Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted. 77 Hen. VI. 3: 2. 

Draw those Heaven-moving pearls from his poor eyes 
Which Heaven shall take in nature of a fee; 
Ay with these crystal beads Heaven shall be brib'd 
To do him justice, and revenge on you. King John 2: 1. 

Be just, and fear not : 
Let all the ends thou aimest at be thy country's, 
Thy God's and Truth's ; then, if thou fall'st, O Cromwell, 
Thou fall'st a blessed martyr. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

Like a traitor coward. 
Sluic'd out his innocent soul through streams of blood : 
Which blood, like sacrificing Abel's cries, 
Even from the tongueless caverns of the earth, 
To me for justice and rough chastisement. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

May he continue .... and do justice 
For truth's sake, and his conscience ; that his bones, 
When he has run his course, and sleeps in blessings, 
May have a tomb of orphan's tears wept on 'em ! 

Hen. VIII. 3:2. 
Go take hence that traitor from our sight ; 
For, by his death, we do perceive his guilt : 
And God in justice, hath reveal 'd to us 
The truth and innocence of this poor fellow 
Which he had thought to have murder'd wrongfully. 

II Hen. VI. 2:3. 

If God will be avenged for the deed, 

O, know you, yet he doth it publicly ; 

Take not the quarrel from his powerful arm ; 

He needs no indirect or lawless course, 

To cut off those that have offended him. Rich. III. 1: 4. 



172 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

I know not whether God will have it so, 
For some displeasing service I have done, 
That, in his secret doom, out of my blood 
He'll breed revengement and a scourge for me ; 
But thou dost, in thy passages of life, 
Make me believe, that thou art only mark'd 
For the hot vengeance and the rod of heaven, 
To punish my mistreadings. / Hen. IV. 5: 2. 

Gaunt. God's is the quarrel; for God's substitute 1 
His deputy anointed in His sight, 
Hath caus'd his death; the which, if wrongfully, 
Let Heaven revenge ; for I may never lift 
An angry arm against His minister. 

Duch. Where then, alas! may I complain myself? 

Gau. To God, the widow's champion and defence. 

Rich. II. 1:2. 

In the corrupted currents of this world, 

Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice; 

And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself 

Buys out the law ; but 'tis not so above ; 

There is no shuffling, there the action lies 

In his true nature ; and we ourselves compell'd, 

Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults, 

To give in evidence. Ham. 5: j. (See Remorse.) 

Not ever 
The justice and the truth o' the question carries 
The due o' the verdict with it. At what ease 
Might corrupt minds procure knaves as corrupt 
To swear against you ? such things have been done. 
You are potently oppos'd ; with a malice 
Of as great size. Ween you of better luck, 
I mean in perjur'd witness, than your Master, 
Whose minister you are, whiles here He liv'd 
Upon this naughty earth? Hen. VIII. 5: 1. 

Hudson states that the word here given "God's" is so printed in the quartos, 
but in the folios was printed " Heaven's " doubtless on account of the statute 
against the irreverent use of the sacred name. The same change is made in other 
places. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 173 

. . . give your cause to Heaven. 
... If you can pace your wisdom 
In that good path that I wish it to go ; 
And you shall have your bosom on this wretch, 
Grace of the Duke, revenges to your heart, 
And general honor. Me as. for Me as. 4: 3. 

A man may see how this world goes with no eyes. Look with thine 
ears; see how yond' justice rails upon yond' simple thief. Hark, in 
thine ear: change places; and, handy-dandy, which is the justice, which 
is the thief? — Thou hast seen a farmer's dog bark at a beggar? .... 
And the creature run from the cur ? There thou mightst behold the 
great image of authority : a dog's obey'd in office. — 

Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand ! 

Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thine own back; 

Thou hotly lust'st to use her in that kind 

For which thou whipp'st her. The usurer hangs the cozener. 

Through tatter'd clothes small vices do appear; 

Robes, and furr'd gowns, hide all. Plate sin with gold, 

And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks: 

Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it. King Lear 4: 6. 



KNOWLEDGE 

Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven. 

II Hen. IV. 4: 7. 

There are more things in heaven and earth, 

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Ham. 1:5. 

What is the end of study ? let me know. 

Why that to know, which else we should not know. 

Things hid and barr'd, you mean, from common sense ? 

Ay, that is study's god-like recompense 

Study knows that which yet it doth not know. . . . 

Study is like the heaven's glorious sun, 

That will not be deep-search'd with saucy looks. . . . 

Too much to know is to know nought but fame. (See Light.) 

Love's Labor 1: 1. 



174 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

We have our philosophical persons, to make modern and familiar 
things supernatural and causeless. Hence it is that we make trifles of 
terrors ; ensconcing ourselves into seeming knowledge. All's Well 2: 3. 



LIFE— TIME 

Thy life's a miracle. King Lear 4: 6. 

We trifle time away. Hen. VIII. 5: 2. 

Like madness is the glory of this life. Timon 1 : 2- 

O, call back yesterday, bid time return. Rich. II. 3: 2. 

(Time) thou ceaseless lackey to eternity. Lacrece, St. 139. 

Let life be short ; else shame will be too long. He n. V. 4: 5. 

Time travels in divers paces with divers persons. 

As You Like It 3: 2. 

Old Time the clock-setter, that bald sexton, Time. 

King John 3: 1. 

The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together. 

All's Well 4: 3. 

Out, out, brief candle ! 
Life's but a walking shadow. Macb. 5: 5. 

Time, that takes survey of all the world, 
Must have a stop. / Hen. IV. 5: 4. 

Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and 
Let Time try. As You Like It 4:1. 

The time of life is short ; 
To spend that shortness basely were too long, 
If life did ride upon a dial's point, 
Still ending at the arrival of an hour. / Hen. IV. 5: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 175 

Time, force, and death, 
Do to this body what extremity you can. Troi. and Cres. 4: 2. 

Why day is day, night, night, and time is time, 

Were nothing but to waste night, day, and time. Ham. 2: 2. 

Come what, come may, 
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day. Macb. 1:3. 

I do not set my life at a pin's fee 

And, for my soul, what can it do to that, 

Being a thing immortal as itself? Ham. 1: 4. 

This day I breath'd first : time is come round ; 
And where I did begin there shall I end ; 
My life is run his compass. Jul. Caesar 5:3. 

And so, from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe, 
And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot, 
And thereby hangs a tale. As You Like It 2: J. 

The end crowns all ; 
And that old common arbiter, Time, 
Will one day end it. Troi. and Cres. 4: 5. 

But thought the slave of life, and life time's fool : 
And time, that takes survey of all the world, 
Must have a stop. / Hen. IV. 5: 4. 

Time's the King of men 
For he's their parent, and he's their grave, 
And gives them what he will, not what they crave. Pericles 2: 5. 

And this our life, exempt from public haunt, 

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 

Sermons in stones, and good in everything. As You Like It 2: 1. 

. . . how brief the life of man 

Runs his erring pilgrimage ; 

That the stretching of a span 

Buckles in his sum of age. As You Like It 3: 2. 



176 SCRIPTURE THEMES IHT SHAKSPEARE 

O, this life 
Is nobler, than attending for a check ; 
Richer, than doing nothing for a bribe. 1 Cytnb. 3 : 3. 

May he live 
Longer than I have time to tell his years ! 
Ever beloved, and loving, may his rule be ! 
And, when old time shall lead him to his end, 
Goodness and he fill up one monument ! Hen. VIII. 2: 1. 

See the minutes how they run : 
How many make the hour full complete, 
How many hours bring about the day, 
How many days will finish up the year, 
How many years a mortal man may live. 77/ Hen. VI. 2: 5. 

I cannot tell what you and other men 

Think of this life ; but, for my single self, 

I had as lief not be as live to be 

In awe of such a thing as myself. Jul. Caesar 1: 2. 

Let's take this instant by the forward top ; 
For we are old, and on our quickest decrees 
The inaudible and noiseless foot of time 
Steals, ere we can effect them. All's Well 5: 3. 

Had I but died an hour before this chance, 
I had liv'd a blessed time, for from this instant 
There's nothing serious in mortality ; 
All is but toys : renown and grace are dead ; 
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees is left this vault to 
brag of. Macb. 2: 3. 

I have liv'd long enough : my way of life 

Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf; 

And that which should accompany old age, 

As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends, 

I must not look to have ; but, in their stead, 

Curses, not loud, but deep, mouth-honor, breath, 

Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not. Macb. 5: 3. 

1 Steevens and others substitute the word "babe" for bribe. 



SCRIPTURE, THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 177 

Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear, 
Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste; 
The vacant leaves thy mind's imprint will bear, 
And of this book this learning may'st thou taste : 
The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show, 
Of mouthed graves will give thee memory ; 
Thou by thy dial's shady stealth may'st know 
Time's thievish progress to eternity. Sonnet 77. 

Time's glory is to calm contending kings, 

To unmask falsehood, and bring truth to light, 

To stamp the seal of time in aged things, 

To wake the morn, and sentinel the night, 

To wrong the wronger till he render right ; 
To ruinate proud buildings with thy hours, 
And smear with dust their glittering golden towers 

To cheer the ploughman with increaseful crops, 

And waste huge stones with little water-drops. Lucrece, St. 135. 7. 

Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness ! 
This is the state of man : to-day he puts forth 
The tender leaves of hopes, to-morrow blossoms, 
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him : 
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ; 
And, — when he thinks, good easy man, full surely 
His greatness is a ripening, — nips his root, 
And then he falls, as I do. I have ventur'd, 
Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, 
This many summers in a sea of glory, 
But far beyond my depth : my high blown pride 
At length broke under me; and now has left me, 
Weary and old with service, to the mercy 
Of a rude stream, that must forever hide me. 
Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye : 
I feel my heart new open'd. O ! how wretched 
Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favors ! 
There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to, 
That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin, 
More pangs and fears than wars or women have; 
And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, 
Never to hope again. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 
12 



178 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws, 
And make the earth devour her own sweet brood * 
Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws, 
And burn the long-liv'd phoenix in her blood : 
Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets, 
And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, 
To the wide world, and all her fading sweets ; 
But I forbid thee one most heinous crime : . . 
Yet, do thy worst, old Time : despite thy wrong, 
My love shall in my verse ever live young. Sonnet 19. 

When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced 
The rich proud cost of out-worn buried age; 
When sometime lofty towers I see down-rased, 
And brass eternal, slave to mortal rage : 
When I have seen the hungry ocean gain 
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, 
And the firm soil win of the watery main, 
Increasing store with loss, and loss with store : 
When I have seen such interchange of state, 
Or state itself confounded to decay, 
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate — 
That time will come and take my love away. 
This thought is as a death, which cannot choose 
But weep to have that which it fears to lose. Sonnet 64. 

No ! Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change : 
Thy pyramids, built up with newer might, 
To me are nothing novel, nothing strange; 
They are but dressings of a former sight. 
Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire 
What thou dost foist upon us that is old, 
And rather make them born to our desire, 
Than think that we before have heard them told. 
Thy registers and thee I both defy, 
Not wondering at the present, nor the past ; 
For thy records and what we see do lie, 
Made more or less by thy continual haste. 

This I do vow, and this shall ever be, 

I will be true, despite thy scythe and thee. Sonnet 12$. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 179 

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, 
But sad mortality o'er-sways their power, 
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, 
Whose action is no stronger than a flower ? 
O ! how shall summer's honey-breath hold out 
Against the wreckful siege of battering days, 
When rocks impregnable are not so stout, 
Nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays? 
O fearful meditation ! where, alack, 
Shall time's best jewel from time's chest lie hid? 
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back ? 
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid ? Sonnet 65. 

Reason thus with life : 
If do lose thee, I do lose a thing 
That none but fools would keep : a breath thou art. . . 

thou art death's fool ; 

For him thou labor'st by thy flight to shun, 

And yet run'st toward him still : thou art not noble ; 

For all th' accommodations that thou bear'st, 

Are nurs'd by baseness : thou art by no means valiant ; 

For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork 

Of a poor worm : thy best of rest is sleep, 

And that thou oft provok'st, yet grossly fear'st 

Thy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself; 

For thou exist'st on many a thousand grains 

That issue out of dust : happy thou art not ; 

For what thou hast not, still thou striv'st to get, 

And what thou hast forget'st. Thou art not certain ; 

For thy complexion shifts to strange effects, 

After the moon: if thou art rich, thou 'rt poor; 

For, like an ass, whose back with ingots bows, 

Thou bear'st thy heavy riches but a journey, 

And death unloads thee : friend hast thou none ; 

For thine own bowels, which do call thee sire, 

The mere effusion of thy proper loins, 

Do curse the gout, serpigo, 1 and the rheum, 

For ending thee no sooner : thou hast nor youth, nor age, 

But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep, 

1 A tetter, or rash on the skin. 



180 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Dreaming on both ; for all thy blessed youth 

Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms 

Of palsied eld : and when thou art old and rich, 

Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty, 

To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this, 

That bears the name of life? Yet in this life 

Lie hid more thousand deaths, yet death we fear, 

That makes these odds all even. Meas. for Meas. j: i. 



LIGHT AND DARKNESS 

Light and lust are deadly enemies. ( See Lust.) Lucrece, St. 97. 

How far that little candle throws his beams 

So shines a good deed in a naughty world. Mer. of Ven. 5: 1. 

To seek the light of truth, while truth the while 
Doth falsely blind the eyesight of his look : 
Light, seeking light, doth light of light beguile. 
(See Knowledge.) Love's Labor 1:1. 

Heaven does with us as we with torches do, 
Not light them for ourselves ; for if our virtues 
Did not go forth with us' t'were all alike 
As if we had them not. Meas. for Meas. 1: 1. 

When the searching eye of heaven is hid 
Behind the globe, and lights the lower world, 
Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen, 
In murders, and in outrage, bloody here ; 
But when, from under this terrestrial ball, 
He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines, 
And darts his light through every guilty hole, 
Then murders, treasons, and detested sins, 
The cloak of night being pluck'd from off their backs, 
Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves. Rich. II. j: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARB 181 

LOVE (See Marriage) 

Love reasons without reason. Cymb. 4: 2. 

Love is not love 
Which alters when it alteration finds. Sonnet 116. 

For charity itself fulfills the law : 

And who can sever love from charity ? Love's Labor 4: 5. 

. . . how can that be true love, which is falsely attempted? Love is 
a familiar ! love is a devil : there is no evil angel but love. Yet was 
Solomon so seduced ; he had a very good wit. Love's Labor 1: 2. 

I confess, 
Here on my knee, before high heaven and you, 
That before you, and next unto high heaven, 
I love your son. — 

My friends were poor, but honest ; so's my love : 
Be not offended, for it hurts not him, 
That he is lov'd of me. I follow him not 
By any token of presumptuous suit ; 
Nor would I have him, till I do deserve him, 
Yet never know how that desert should be. 
I know I love in vain, strive against hope ; 
Yet, in this captious and intenible sieve, 
I still pour in the waters of my love, 
And lack not to lose still. Thus Indian-like, 
Religious in mine error, I adore 
The sun, that looks upon his worshiper, 
But knows of him no more. All's Well 1:3. 



182 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 



LUST 

Light and lust are deadly enemies. . . . 

Pure chastity is rifled of her store, 

And Lust, the thief, far poorer than before. Lucrece, St. p/, pp. 

Fie on sinful fantasy ! 

Fie on lust and luxury ! 

Lust is but a bloody fire, 

Kindled with unchaste desire, 

Fed in heart ; whose flames aspire, 

As thoughts do blow them, higher and higher. 

Song in Merry Wives 5: 5. 

So from himself impiety hath wrought, 
That for his prey to pray he doth begin, 
As if the heavens should countenance his sin. 

But in the midst of his unfruitful prayer, 

Having solicited th' eternal power, 

That his foul thoughts might compass his fair fair, 

And they would stand auspicious to the hour, 

Even there he starts : — quoth he, I must deflower : 

The powers to whom I pray abhor this fact, 

How can they, then, assist me in the act? Lucrece, St. 49, 50. 

Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame 

Is lust in action ; and till action, lust 

Is perjur'd, murderous, bloody, full of blame, 

Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust ; 

Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight ; 

Past reason hunted, and no sooner had, 

Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait, 

On purpose laid to make the taker mad : 

Mad in pursuit, and in possession so ; 

Had, having, and in quest to have extreme ; 

A bliss in proof, — and proved, a very woe ; 

Before, a joy propos'd ; behind, a dream : 

All this the world well knows, yet none knows well 

To shun the heaven that leads to this hell. Sonnet 129. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 183 

Such an act, 
That blurs the grace and blush of modesty ; 
Calls virtue, hypocrite ; takes off the rose 
From the fair forehead of an innocent love, 
And sets a blister there ; makes marriage vows 
As false as dicers' oaths : O ! such a deed, 
As from the body of contraction plucks 
The very soul ; and sweet religion makes 
A rhapsody of words : Heaven's face doth glow, 
Yea, this solidity and compound mass, 
With tristful visage, as against the doom, 

Is thought-sick at the act 

O shame ! where is thy blush ? Rebellious hell, 
If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones, 
To flaming youth let virtue be as wax, 
And melt in her own fire. Ham. j: 4. 

. . . — his words — do no more adhere than the hundredth psalm of 
the tune of Green Sleeves. ... I think the best way were to entertain 
him with hope till the wicked fire of lust have melted him in his own 

grease 

Why Sir John, do you think, though we would have thrust virtue 
out of our hearts by the head and shoulders, and have given ourselves 
without scruple to hell that ever the devil could have made you our 
delight? Merry Wives 2: 1 and 5: 5. 



MAN 

I think the king is but a man, as I am. Hen. V. 4: 1. 

He speaks not like a man of God's making. Love's Labor 5: 2. 

Immortality attends the founer, making a man a god. 
(See Virtue.) Pericles 3: 2. 

God made him and therefore let him pass for a man. 

Mer. of Ven. 1:2. 

To see how God in all his creature's works ! 

Yea, man and birds are fain of climbing high. // Hen. VI. 2: 1. 



i84 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

But we all are men, 
In our own natures frail, and capable 
Of our flesh ; few are angels. Hen. VIII. 5: 2. 

Are we not brothers ? 

So man and man should be ; 
But clay and clay differs in dignity, 
Whose dust is both alike. Cymb. 4: 2. 

Man, proud man ! 
Drest in a little brief authority ; 
Most ignorant of what he's most assur'd, 
His glassy essence, — like an angry ape, 
Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven, 
As make the angels weep. Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

There's nothing situate under heaven's eye 

But hath his bound, in earth, in sea, in sky : 

The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls, . . . 

Men, more divine, the masters of all these, 

Lords of the wide world, and wild watery seas, 

Indued with intellectual sense and souls. Com. of Err. 2: 1. 

What is a man, 
If his chief good and market of his time, 
Be but to sleep, and feed ? a beast, no more. 
Sure, he, that made us with such large discourse, 
Looking before and after, gave us not 
That capability and godlike reason, 
To fust in us unus'd. Ham. 4: 4. 

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin, — 
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gawds, 
Though they are made and moulded of things past, 
And give to dust, that is a little gilt, 
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted. 
The present eye praises the present object : 
Then, marvel not, thou great and complete man, 
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax, 
Since things in motion quicklier catch the eye, 
Than what not stirs. Troi. and Cres. 3:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 185 

Thou seest, we are not all alone unhappy: 
This wide and universal theatre 
Presents more woeful pageants than the scene 
Wherein we play in. All the world's a stage, 
And all the men and women merely players : 
They have their exits and their entrances 
And one man in his time plays many parts 
His acts being seven ages. As You Like It 2: 7. 

Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness ! 
This is the state of man : To-day he puts forth 
The tender leaves of hopes, to-morrow blossoms, 
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him : 
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost; 
And, — When he thinks, good easy man, full surely 
This greatness is ripening, — nips his root, and then he falls, as 
I do. Hen. VIII. 3:2. 

Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, till he 
find it stopping a bung-hole ? . . . . 

... as thus: Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander 
returned into dust ; the dust is earth ; of earth we make loam, and why 
of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer- 
barrel ? 

" Imperial Caesar dead, and turn to clay, 
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away: 
O ! that that earth, which kept the world in awe, 
Should patch a wall t' expel the winter's flaw !" Ham. 5: 1. 

What a piece of work is a man ! How noble in reason ! how infinite 
in faculty ! in form and moving, how express and admirable ! in action, 
how like an angel ! in apprehension, how like a god ! the beauty of the 
world ! the paragon of animals ! And yet, to me, what is the quintes- 
sence of dust ? man delights not me ; no, nor woman neither. Ham. 2: 2. 

O ! there be players, that I have seen play, — and heard others praise, 
and that highly, — not to speak it profanely, that, neither having the 
accent of Christians, nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so 
strutted, and bellowed, that I have thought some of nature's journeymen 
had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so 
abominably. Ham. 3: 2. 



186 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 



MAN'S RESPONSIBILITY 

Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, 
Which we ascribe to Heaven : the fated sky 
Gives us free scope. All's Well i: J. 

Men at some time are masters of their fates : 
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, 
But in ourselves. Jul. Caesar 1:2. 

Faith, I have been a truant in the law ; 

And never yet could frame my will to it ; 

And, therefore, frame the law unto my will. / Hen. VI. 2: 4. 

This is the excellent foppery of the world ! that, when we are sick in 
fortune, (often the surfeit of our own behavior) we make guilty of our 
disasters the sun, the moon, and stars : as if we were villains on neces- 
sity ; fools by heavenly compulsion ; knaves, thieves, and treachers 1 by 
spherical predominance ; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced 
obedience of planetary influence ; and all that we are evil in, by a divine 
thrusting on. King Lear 1: 2. 

So, if a son, that is by his father sent about merchandise, do sinfully 
miscarry upon the sea, the imputation of his wickedness, by your rule, 
should be imposed upon his father that sent him : or if a servant, under 
his master's command, transporting a sum of money, be assailed by rob- 
bers, and die in many irreconciled iniquities, you may call the business 
of the master the author of the servant's damnation. But this is not so : 
the king is not bound to answer the particular endings of his soldiers, 
the father of his son, nor the master of his servant ; for they purpose 
not their death, when they purpose their services. Besides, there is no 
king, be his cause never so spotless, if it come to the arbitrement of 
swords, can try it out with all unspotted soldiers. Some, peradyenture, 
have on them the guilt of premeditated and contrived murder; some, 
of beguiling virgins with the broken seals of perjury; some, making the 
wars their bulwark, that have before gored the gentle bosom of peace 
with pillage and robbery. Now, if these men have defeated the law, and 
outrun native punishment, though they can outstrip men, they have no 
wings to fly from God : war is his beadle : war is his vengeance ; so that 

1 " Treacher," — a trickster, a cheat. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 187 

here men are punished, for before-breach of the king's laws, in now the 
king's quarrel : where they feared the death, they have borne life away, 
and where they would be safe, they perish : then, if they die unprovided, 
no more is the king guilty of their damnation, than he was before guilty 
of those impieties for the which they are now visited. Every subject's 
duty is the king's; but every subject's soul is his own. Therefore, 
should every soldier in the wars do as every sick man in his bed, wash 
every mote out of his conscience ; and dying so, death is to him advan- 
tage ; or not dying, the time was blessedly lost, wherein such prepara- 
tion was gained : and, in him that escapes, it were not sin to think, that 
making God so free an offer, he let him outlive that day to see his great- 
ness, and to teach others how they should prepare. Hen. V. 4: 1. 



MARRIAGE 

A world-without-end bargain. Love's Labor 5: 2. 

In the temple, by and by with us, 

These couples shall eternally be knit. Mid. Dream 4: 1. 

The instances, that second marriage move 

Are base respects of thrift, but none of love. Ham. 3: 2. 

I will fasten on this sleeve of thine : 

Thou art an elm, my husband, I, a vine. Com. of Err. 2: 2. 

... At Saint Mary's chapel, presently 

The rites of marriage shall be solemnized. King John 2: 2. 

She doth stray about 
By holy crosses, where she kneels and prays 
For happy wedlock hours. Mer. of Ven. 5: 1. 

What mockery will it be, 
To want the bridegroom, when the priest attends 
To speak the ceremonial rites of marriage. Tarn. Shrew 3:2. 

Under what title shall I woo for thee, 

That God, the law, my honor, and her love 

Can make seem pleasing to her tender years? Rich. HI. 4: 4. 



188 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Get you to church, and have a good priest that can tell you what 
marriage is. As You Like It 3: 3. 

Hasty marriage seldom proveth well (Yet) 

God forbid that I should wish them sever'd 

Whom God hath join'd together. /// Hen. VI. 4: 1. 

Nature craves 
All dues render'd to their owners : Now 
What nearer debt in all humanity 
Than wife is to the husband? Troi. and Cres. 2: 2. 

Now go with me, and with this holy man, 

Into the chantry by : there, before him, 

And underneath that consecrated roof, 

Plight me the full assurance of your faith. Twelfth Night 4: 3. 

If you shall marry, 
You give away this hand, and that is mine ; 
You give away Heaven's vows, and those are mine ; 
You give away myself, which is known mine. All's Well 5: 3. 

As there comes light from heaven, and words from breath 

As there is sense in truth, and truth in virtue 

I am affianc'd this man's wife, as strongly 

As words could make up vows. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 

I will make you man and wife: . . . 
Nay, come, your hands and lips must seal it too: 
And, being join'd, I'll thus your hopes destroy; — 
And for a further grief, — God give you joy ! — 
What, are you both pleas'd ? Pericles 2: 5. 

Methinks, a father 

Is, at the nuptial of his son, a guest 

That best becomes the table. . . . 

Reason, my son 
Should choose himself a wife ; but as good reason, 
The father (all whose joy is nothing else 
But fair posterity) should hold some counsel 
In such a business. Winter's Tale 4:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 189 

Marriage is a matter of more worth 

Than to be dealt in by attorneyship ; . . . „ 

For what is wedlock forced but a hell, 

An age of discord and continual strife ? 

Whereas the contrary bringeth forth bliss 

And is a pattern of celestial peace. / Hen. VI. 5: 5. 

O, now let Richmond and Elizabeth, 

The true-succeeders of each royal house, 

By God's fair ordinance conjoin together! 

And let their heirs (God, if they will be so) 

Enrich the time to come with smooth-faced peace, 

With smiling plenty, and fair prosperous days ! Rich. III. 5; 4. 

Then, as my gift, and thine own acquisition 

Worthily purchased, take my daughter: But 

If thou dost break her virgin knot before 

All sanctimonious ceremonies may 

With full and holy rite be minister'd, 

No sweet aspersion shall the heavens let fall 

To make this contract grow. The Tempest 4: 1. 

Then is there mirth in heaven, 

When earthly things made even ^ 

At one together. 
Good duke, receive thy daughter 
Hymen from heaven brought her 

Yea, brought her hither ; 
That thou might'st join her hand with his, 
Whose heart within her bosom is. Song in As You Like It 5: 4. 

My heart's dear love is set 
On the fair daughter of rich Capulet : 
As mine on hers ; so hers is set on mine 
And all combin'd, save what thou must combine 
By holy marriage. . . . this I pray 

That thou consent to marry us to-day 

Come come with me, and we will make short work ; 
For, by your leaves, you shall not stay alone 
Till holy church incorporate two in one. 

Rom. and Jul. 2: 5 and 2: 6. 



iqo SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

God, the best maker of all marriages, 
Combine your hearts in one, your realms in one ! 
As man and wife, being two, are one in love, 
So be there 'twixt your kingdoms such a spousal, 
That never may ill office or fell jealousy, 
Which troubles oft the bed of blessed marriage, 
Thrust in between. Hen. V. 5: 2. 

Let not the marriage of true minds 

Admit impediments. Love is not love 

Which alters when it alteration finds. . . . 

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 

Within his bending sickle's compass come ; 

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 

But bears it out even to the edge of doom. Sonnet 116. 

Heaven witness, 
I have been to you a true and humble wife. . . . 
. . . Sir, call to mind 
That I have been your wife, in this obedience 

Upward of twenty years If, in the course 

And process of this time, you can report, 
And prove it too, against my honor aught, 
My bond to wedlock, or my love and duty 
Against your sacred person, in God's name 
Turn me away. Hen. VIII. 2: 4. 

God join'd my heart and Romeo's, thou our hands ; 
And ere this hand, by thee to Romeo seal'd, 

Shall be the label to another deed 

. . . O, bid me leap, rather than marry Paris, 

From off the battlements of yonder tower, 

Or walk in thievish ways ; or bid me lurk 

Where serpents are ; chain me with roaring bears ; 

Or hide me nightly in a charnel-house, 

O'er-cover'd quite with dead men's rattling bones, 

With reeky shanks, and yellow chapless skulls; 

Or bid me go into a new-made grave, 

And hide me with a dead man in his shroud ; 

Things that, to hear them told, have made me tremble ; 

And I will do it without fear or doubt, 

To live an unstain'd wife to my sweet love. Rom. and Jul. 4: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 191 

As a walled town is more worthier than a village, so is the fore- 
head of a married man more honorable than the bare brow of a 
bachelor. As You Like It 3:3. 

I had rather be married to a death's head with a bone in his mouth, 
than to either of these. God defend me from these two. ... I will do 
anything, Nerissa, ere I will be married to a sponge. ... If I should 
bid the fifth welcome with so good heart as I can bid the other four 
farewell I should be glad of his approach : if he have the condition of a 
saint, and the complexion of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me 
than wive me. Mer. of Ven. 1: 2. 

Well, niece, I hope to see you one day fitted with a husband 

Not till God make men of some other metal than earth. . . . No, 
Uncle I'll none : Adam's sons are my brethren ; and truly I hold it a sin 
to match in my kindred. . . . 

I would not marry her though she were endowed with all that Adam 
had left him before he transgress'd. . . . 

. . . Name the day of marriage, and God give thee joy ! . . . His 
grace hath made the match and all grace say Amen to it ! . . . Silence 
is the perfectest herald of joy : I were but little happy if I could say how 
much. Lady, as you are mine, I am yours : . . . Time goes on crutches 
till Love have all his rites. Much Ado 2: 1. 



MEEKNESS— CONTENTMENT— HUMILITY 

Poor and content is rich, and rich enough. Othello 3: 3. 

He is fam'd for mildness, peace, and prayer. 77/ Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

God bless thee, and put meekness in thy breast 

Love, charity, obedience and true duty. Rich. III. 2: 2. 

I shall be well content with any choice 

Tends to God's glory, and my country's weal. / Hen. VI. 5: 1. 

Love and meekness, lord, 
Become a churchman better than ambition : 
Win straying souls with modesty again, 
Cast none away. Hen. VIII. 5: 2. 



192 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Now, my co-mates and brothers in exile, 
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet 
Than that of painted pomp ? As You Like It 2: L 

My crown is in my heart, not on my head ; 

Not deck'd with diamonds and Indian stones, 

Nor to be seen ; my crown is called content, 

A crown it is that seldom kings enjoy. 777 Hen. VI. 5; I. 

'Tis better to be lowly born, 
And range with humble livers in content, 
Than to be perk'd up in a glistering grief, 
And wear a golden sorrow. . . . Our content 
Is our best having. Hen. VIII. 2: 5. 

His overthrow heaped happiness upon him; 

For then, and not till then, he felt himself, 

And found the blessedness of being little : 

And, to add greater honors to his age 

Than man could give him, he died fearing God. Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 

O God ! methinks, it were a happy life, 

To be no better than a homely swain ; 

To sit upon a hill, as I do now, 

To carve out dials quaintly, point by point, 

Thereby to see the minutes how they run : 

How many make the hour full complete, 

How many hours bring about the day, 

How many days will finish up the year, 

How many years a mortal man may live. 

When this is known, then to divide the times. 

So many hours must I tend my flock ; 

So many hours must I take my rest ; . . . . 

So minutes, hours, days, months and years, 

Pass'd over to the end they were created, 

Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. 

Ah, what a life were this ! how sweet ! how lovely ! 

Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade 

To shepherds looking on their silly sheep 

Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy 

To kings that fear their subjects' treachery? 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 193 

O ! yes it doth ; a thousand fold it doth. 

And to conclude, — the shepherd's homely curds, 

His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle, 

His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade, 

All which secure and sweetly he enjoys, 

Is far beyond a prince's delicates, 

His viands sparkling in a golden cup, 

His body couched in a curious bed, 

When care, mistrust, and treason wait on him. /// Hen. VI. 2: 5. 



MERCY 

Have mercy Jesu! Rich. III. 5:3. 

God in mercy so deal with my soul. // Hen. VI. 1: 3. 

The gates of mercy shall be all shut up. Hen. V. 3: 3. 

God have mercy upon one of our souls ! Twelfth Night 3: 4. 

There is no more mercy in him than there is milk in a male tiger. 

Corio. 5: 4. 
Mercy then will breathe within your lips, 
Like man new made. Me as. for Me as. 2: 2. 

Lawful mercy 
Is nothing kin to foul redemption. Meas. for Meas. 2:4. 

Open thy gate of mercy, gracious God 

My soul flies through these wounds to seek out thee. 

// Hen. VI. 1: 4. 

When vice makes mercy, mercy's so extended, 
That for the fault's love is the offender friended. 

Meas. for Meas. 4: 2. 

And bids you, in the bowels of the Lord 
Deliver up the crown ; and to take mercy 
On the poor souls for whom this hungry war 
Opens his vasty jaws. Hen. V. 2: 4. 
13 



194 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Use every one after his desert, and who should 
Escape whipping ! Ham. 2: 2. 

O Lord, have mercy on us, wretched sinners ! 

Lord, have mercy on me, woeful man ! / H en. VI. 1: 4. 

Beyond the infinite and boundless reach 
Of mercy, if thou didst this deed of death 
Art thou damned. King John 4: 5. 

Wilt thou draw near the nature of the gods? 

Draw near then in being merciful : 

Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge. Titus And. 1:2. 

Not the king's crown, nor the deputed sword 
The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe 
Become them with one half so good a grace 
As mercy does. Meas. for Me as. 2: 2. 

1 have not stopp'd mine ears to their demands 
Nor posted off their suits with slow delays ; 
My pity hath been balm to heal their wounds, 
My mildness hath allay'd their swelling griefs, 

My mercy dried their water-flowing tears. /// Hen. VI. 4: 8. 

Pity is the virtue of the law, 
And none but tyrants use it cruelly. . . . 
As you are great, be pitifully good : 
Who cannot condemn rashness in cold blood? 
To kill, I grant, is sin's extremest gust ; 
But, in defense, by mercy, 'tis most just. 
To be in anger is impiety ; 
But who is man that is not angry ? 
Weigh but the crime with this. Tim. of Athens 5: 5. 

The quality of mercy is not strain'd, 
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven 
Upon the place beneath : it is twice bless'd ; 
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes ; 
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest ; it becomes 
The throned monarch better than his crown : 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 195 

His sceptre shows the force of temporal power, 

The attribute to awe and majesty, 

Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings ; 

But mercy is above this sceptred sway : 

It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, 

It is an attribute to God himself, 

And earthly power doth then show likest God's, 

When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew, 

Though justice be thy plea, consider this, — 

That in the course of justice none of us 

Should see salvation ; we do pray for mercy ; 

And that same prayer doth teach us all to render 

The deeds of mercy. Mer. of Ven. 4:1. 

. . . For God's sake, pity my case! the spite of man prevaileth 
against me. O Lord have mercy upon me. O Lord, have mercy upon 
me ! I shall never be able to fight a blow : O Lord, my heart ! 
II Hen. VI. 1:3. 



MIRACLES 

Thy life's a miracle. King Lear 4: 6. 

It must be so: for miracles are ceased; 

And therefore we must needs admit the means 

How things are perfected. Hen. V. 1: 1. 

Virtuous and holy ; chosen from above, 

By inspiration of celestial grace, 

To work exceeding miracles on earth. / Hen. VI. 5: 4. 

Great floods have flown 
From simple sources ; and great seas have dried, 
When miracles have by the greatest been denied. All's Well 2: 1. 

They say, miracles are past ; and we have our philosophical persons, 
to make modern and familiar things supernatural and causeless. Hence 
is it that we make trifles of terrors ; ensconcing ourselves into seeming 
knowledge, when we should submit to an unknown fear. 

All's Well 2: 3. 



ig6 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 



NATURE'S LESSONS 

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin. 

Trot, and Cres. 3:3. 
In nature's infinite book of secrecy 
A little I can read. Ant. and Cleo. i: 2. 

At Christmas I no more desire a rose 

Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled shows. Love's Labor i: I. 

How sometimes nature will betray its folly, 
Its tenderness, and make itself a pastime 
To harder bosoms! Winter's Tale 1:2. 

Nature does require 
Her times of preservation, which, perforce, 
I her frail son, amongst my brethren mortal, 
Must give my tendance to. Hen. VIII. 3:2. 

In nature there's no blemish but the mind ; 
None can be call'd deform'd but the unkind 
Virtue is beauty ; but the beauteous evil 
Are empty trunks, o'erflourish'd by the devil. 

Tzvelfth Night 5: 4. 

Are not these woods 
More free from peril than the envious court ? 
Here feel we not the penalty of Adam, 
The season's difference, or the icy fang, 
And churlish chiding of the winter's wind, 
Which when it bites, and blows upon my body, 
Even till I shrink with cold, I smile, and say, 
This is no flattery : these are counsellors 
That feelingly persuade me what I am. 
Sweet are the uses of adversity, 
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, 
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head ; 
And this our life, exempt from public haunt, 
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing. 

As You Like It 2: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 197 

When clouds are seen, wise men put on their cloaks ; 
When great leaves fall, then winter is at hand : 
When the sun sets, who doth not look for night ? 
Untimely storms make men expect a dearth. 
All may be well ; but, if God sort it so, 

"Tis more than we deserve, or I expect 

By a divine instinct men's minds mistrust 
Pursuing danger ; as by proof we see 
The water swell before a boisterous storm. 
But leave it all to God. Rich. III. 2: 3. 



OBEDIENCE 

Let him obey that know not how to rule. // Hen. VI. 5 'I. 

I hourly learn a doctrine of obedience. Ant. and Cleo. 5: 2. 

You sin against 
Obedience which you owe your father. Cymb. 2:3. 

Obey thy parents; keep thy word's justice; swear not; commit not 
with man's sworn spouse ; set not thy sweet heart on proud array. 
King Lear 3 : 4. 

I do not know 
What kind of my obedience I should tender, 
More than my all is nothing ; nor my prayers 
Are not words duly hallow'd. (See Prayer.) Hen. VIII. 2: 3. 

Therefore doth Heaven divide 
The state of man in divers functions, 
Setting endeavor in continual motion; 
To which is fixed, as an aim or butt, 
Obedience. Hen. V. 1: 2. 



ig8 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

OFFICIAL CORRUPTION— TYRANNY 

O ! that estates, degrees, and offices 

Were not deriv'd corruptly. Mer. of Ven. 2: p. 

Plate sin, with gold, 
And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks ; 
Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it. King Lear 4:6. 

Thieves for their robbery have authority, 

When Judges steal themselves 

O, it is excellent 
To have a giant's strength ; but it is tyrannous 
To use it like a giant. Me as. for Meas. 2: 2. 

And let me tell you Cassius, you yourself 

Are much condemn'd to have an itching palm ; 

To sell and mart your offices for gold to underservers. 

. . . Shall we now 
Contaminate our fingers with base bribes, 
And sell the mighty space of our large honors 
For so much trash as may be grasped thus. Jul. Caesar 4: 3. 

Thou little valiant, great in villainy ! 

Thou ever strong upon the stronger side ! 

Thou fortune's champion, that dost never fight 

But when her humorous ladyship is by 

To teach thee safety ! thou art perjur'd too, 

And sooth'st up greatness. What a fool art thou, 

A ramping fool, to brag, and stamp, and swear, 

Upon my party! Thou cold-blooded slave, 

Hast thou not spoke like thunder on my side 

Been sworn my soldier ? bidding me depend 

Upon thy stars, thy fortune, and thy strength ? 

And dost thou now fall over to my foes ? 

Thou wear a lion's hide ! doff it for shame, 

And hang a calf's-skin on those recreant limbs. King John j: I. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 199 

PATIENCE— HOPE 

God, our hope, will succor us. 77 Hen. VI. 4: 5. 

You Heavens, give me that patience, patience I need. King Lear 2: 4. 

A high hope for a low heaven : God grant us patience ! 

Love's Labor 1: 1. 

The miserable have no other medicine, 
But only hope. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 

God of his mercy, give you 
Patience to endure. Hen. V. 2: 2. 

I must be patient, till the heaven's look 

With an aspect more favorable. Winter's Tale 2: 1. 

I here protest, in sight of Heaven, 
And by the hope I have of heavenly bliss. Ill Hen. VI. 5: J. 

Farewell — 
The hopes of court ! my hopes in Heaven do dwell. Hen. VIII. j: 2. 

I will (be patient) 
When you are humble; nay, before, 
Or God will punish me. Hen. VIII. 2: 4. 

Arming myself with patience 
To stay [wait for] the providence of some high powers, 
That govern us below. lul. Caesar 5: 1. 

I died for hope, ere I could lend thee aid: 

But cheer thy heart, and be thou not dismay'd 

God and good angels fight on Richmond's side. Rich. III. 5:5. 

I do oppose 
My patience to his fury ; and am arml'd 
To suffer, with a quietness of spirit, 
The very tyranny and rage of his. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 



200 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

She sat like patience on a monument, 
Smiling at grief. Twelfth Night 2: 4. 

How poor are they that have not patience ! 

What wound did ever heal but by degrees ? Othello 2: 3. 

Then in God's name, march ; 
True hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings, 
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings. Rich. III. 5: 2. 

Had it pleas'd Heaven 
To try me with affliction . . . 
I should have found, in some part of my soul 
A drop of patience. Othello 4: 2. 

. . . Oh ! you blessed ministers above, 
Keep me in patience ; and with ripen'd time, 
Unfold the evil which is here wrapp'd up 
In countenance I 1 Heaven shield your grace from woe 
As I, thus wrong'd, hence unbelieved go. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 



He that will have a cake out of the wheat must needs tarry the grind- 
ing. . . . 
Patience herself, what goddess e'er she be, 
Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do. Trot, and Cres. 1: 1. 

Patience, unmoved, no marvel though she pause; 

They can be meek that have no other cause. 

A wretched soul, bruised with adversity, 

We bid be quiet when we hear it cry ; 

But were we burthen'd with a like weight of pain, 

As much, or more, we should ourselves complain. Com. of Err. 2: 1. 

Bring me a father that so lov'd his child, 
Whose joy of her is overwhelm'd like mine, 
And bid him speak to me of patience ; 
Measure his woe the length and breadth of mine 
And let it answer every strain for strain ; 
As thus for thus, and such a grief for such, 

1 False appearance. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 201 

In every lineament, branch, shape, and form : 

If such a one will smile, and stroke his beard; 

Call sorrow joy ; cry hem, when he should groan ; 

Patch grief with proverbs ; make misfortune drunk 

With candle-wasters ; bring him you to me, 

And I of him will gather patience. 

But there is no such man ; for, brother, men 

Can counsel, and speak comfort to that grief 

Which they themselves not feel ; . . . . 

No, no ; 'tis all men's office to speak patience 

To those that wring under the load of sorrow, 

But no man's virtue, nor sufficiency, 

To be so moral when he shall endure 

The like himself. Therefore give me no counsel: . . . 

. . . For there was never yet philosopher, 

That could endure the tooth-ache patiently, 

However they have writ the style of gods, 

And make a push at chance and sufferance. Much Ado 5: 1. 



PEACE (See War) 
Blessed are the peace-makers on earth. 77 Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

A peace above all earthly dignities. (See Conscience.) 

Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 
I will not think but they ascend the sky 
And there awake God's gentle-sleeping peace. Rich. III. 1:3. 

Make peace with God for you must die. . . . 

Have you that holy feeling in your souls 

To counsel me to make my peace with God? Rich. III. 1: 4. 

Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace, 
To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not; 
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's, 
Thy God's, and truth's. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

I always thought 
It was both impious and unnatural 
That such immanity and bloody strife 
Should reign among professors of one faith. I Hen. VI. 5: J. 



202 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

The peace of heaven is theirs that lift their swords 
In such a just and charitable war. . . . 
Whiles, we, God's wrathful agent, do correct 
Their proud contempt that beat his peace to heaven. 

King John 2: 1. 

But, Warwick, after God, thou sett'st me free, 

And chiefly therefore I thank God and thee ; 

He was the author, thou the instrument. . . . 

. . . Thou art worthy of the sway, 

To whom the Heavens, in thy nativity, 

Adjudg'd an olive-branch, and laurel crown, 

As likely to be bless'd in peace, and war. Ill Hen. VI. 4: 6. 

God and our good cause fight upon our side ; 
The prayers of holy saints and wronged souls 
Like high-rear'd bulwarks stand before our faces. 
. . . One that hath ever been God's enemy. 
Then, if you fight against God's enemy : 
God will, in justice, ward you as his soldiers : 
If you do sweat to put a tyrant down, 
You sleep in peace, the tyrant being slain ; 
If you do fight against your country's foes, 
Your country's fat shall pay your pains the hire ; 
If you do fight in safeguard of your wives, 
Your wives shall welcome home the conquerors ; 
If you do free your children from the sword, 
Your children's children quit it in your age. 
Then, in the name of God, and all these rights, 
Advance your standards, draw your willing swords. 

Rich. III. 5: 3. 

In her days every man shall eat in safety 
Under his own vine what he plants, and sing 
The merry songs of peace to all his neighbors. 
God shall be truly known ; and those about her 
From her shall read the perfect ways of honor, 
And by those claim their greatness, not by blood. 
Nor shall this peace sleep with her : but as when 
The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phoenix, 
Her ashes new create another heir, 
As great in admiration as herself ; 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 203 

So shall she leave her blessedness to one, 

(When heaven shall call her from his cloud of darkness) 

Who, from the sacred ashes of her honor, 

Shall star-like rise, as great in fame as she was 

And so stand fix'd. Peace, plenty, love, truth, terror, 

That were the servants to this chosen infant, 

Shall then be his, and like a vine grow to him : 

Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine, 

His honor and the greatness of his name 

Shall be, and make new nations : he shall flourish, 

And, like a mountain cedar, reach his branches 

To all the plains about him. Our children's children 

Shall see this, and bless heaven. Hen. VIII. 5: 4. 

In the managing of quarrels you may see he is wise; for either he 
avoids them with discretion, or undertakes them with a Christian-like 
fear. 

If he do fear God he must necessarily keep peace ; if he break the 
peace he ought to enter into a quarrel with fear and trembling. 

Much Ado 2: 3. 



PRAISE— THANKFULNESS 

God be praised and blessed. Hen. V. 5: 6. 

To celebrate the joy that God hath given us. I Hen. VI. 1: 6. 

Giving full trophy, signal and ostent 

Quite from himself to God. Chorus to Hen. V. 5. 

Then, Heaven, set ope thy everlasting gates, 

To entertain my vows of thanks and praise ! 77 Hen. VI. 4: 0. 

O God, thy arm was here, 
And not to us, but to thy arm alone, 
Ascribe we all, . . . Take it, God, 
For it is none but thine ! . . . 
And be it death proclaimed through our host, 
To boast of this or take that praise from God, 
Which is his only. Hen. V. 4:8. 



204 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Let never day nor night unhallow'd pass, 

But still remember what the Lord hath done. // Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

I myself will lead a private life, 
And in devotion spend my latter days, 
To sins rebuke, and my Creator's praise. 777 Hen. VI. 4: 6. 



PRAYER 

Now I am past all comfort here, but prayers. Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 

He is fam'd for mildness, peace, and prayer. 77/ Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

The church's prayers made him so prosperous. I Hen. VI. 1: 1. 

They have said their prayers, and they stay for death. Hen. V. 4: 2. 

I will wish her speedy strength and visit her with my prayers. 

Corio. 1:3. 

I stood and heard them: but they did say their prayers. 
(See Conscience.) Macb. 2:2. 

If, when you make your prayers, 

God should be so obdurate as yourselves. 77 Hen. VI. 4: J. 

My words fly up, my thoughts remain below : 

Words, without thoughts, never to heaven go. Ham. 5: 3. 

I have toward heaven breath 'd a secret vow 

To live in prayer and contemplation. Mer. of Ven. 5: 4. 

If ever danger do environ thee, 

Commend thy grievance to my holy prayers. Two Gent. 1: J. 

Our prayers do out-pray his ; then let them have 

That mercy which true prayers ought to have. Rich. II. 5: J. 

All lost ! to prayers, to prayers ! all lost ! 

The wills above be done, but I should fain die a dry death. 

Tempest 1: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 205 

My love till death, my humble thanks, my prayers ; 

That love which virtue begs and virtue grants. /// Hen. VI. j: 2. 

Make of your prayers one sweet sacrifice, 

And lift my soul to heaven. (See Faithfulness.) Hen. VIII. 2: 1. 

His worst fault is that he is given to prayer ; he is something peev- 
ish that way : but nobody but has his faults. Merry Wives 1: 4. 

... In the course of justice, none of us 
Should see salvation : we do pray for mercy, 
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render 
The deeds of mercy. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

Have charged him, 
At the sixth hour of morn, at noon, at midnight, 
To encounter me with orisons, for then 
I am in heaven for him. Cymb. 1: 4. 

We, ignorant of ourselves, 
Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers 
Deny us for our good ; so find we profit 
By losing of our prayers. Ant. and Cleo. 2: I. 

One eye thou hast, to look to heaven for grace ; 

The sun with one eye vieweth all the world. 

Heaven, be thou gracious to none alive, 

If Salisbury wants mercy at thy hand. / Hen. VI. 1: 4. 

My ending is despair, 
Unless I be relieved by prayer ; 
Which pierces so, that it assaults 
Mercy itself, and press all faults. Tempest — Epilogue. 

O Thou ! whose captain I account myself, 

Look on my forces with a gracious eye ; . . . 

Make us thy ministers of chastisement, 

That we may praise thee in thy victory ! 

To thee I do commend my watchful soul, 

Ere I let fall the windows of mine eyes ; 

Sleeping, and waking, O, defend me still. Rich. III. 5: J. 



206 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

My prayers 
Are not words duly hallow'd, nor my wishes 
More worth than empty vanities ; yet prayers, and wishes 
Are all I can return. (See Obedience.) Hen. VIII. 2:3. 

God ! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee, 
But thou wilt be aveng'd on my misdeeds, 

Yet execute thy wrath on me alone: 

O, spare my guiltless wife and my poor children ! Rich. III. 1: 4. 

When I would pray and think, I think and pray 

To several subjects ; Heaven hath my empty words ; 

Whilst my invention, hearing not my tongue, 

Anchors on Isabel : Heaven in my mouth, 

As if I did but only chew his name. Me as. for Meas. 2: 4. 

O, remember, God, 
To hear her prayer for them, as now for us ! 
And for my sister, and her princely sons, 
Be satisfied, dear God, with our true blood, 
Which, as thou know'st unjustly must be spilt. Rich. III. 3: 3. 

Oh, here I lift this one hand up to heaven, 

And bow this feeble ruin to the earth : 

If any power pities wretched tears, 

To that I call : What, wilt thou kneel with me ? 

Do, then, dear heart, for heaven shall hear our prayers. 

Titus And. 3: 1. 

Not with fond shekels of the tested gold, 

Or stones, whose rates are either rich or poor 

As fancy values them ; but with true prayers 

That shall be up at heaven, and enter there, 

Ere sunrise: prayers from preserved souls. Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

1 throw my hands, mine eyes, my heart to thee, 
Thou setter up and plucker down of kings ! 
Beseeching thee, if with thy will it stands 
That to my foes this body must be prey, 

Yet that thy brazen gates of heaven may ope 

And give sweet passage to my sinful soul ! Ill Hen. VI. 2: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 207 

Remember this, — 
God and our good cause, fight upon our side ; 
The prayers of holy saints and wrong'd souls, 
Like high-rear'd bulwarks, stand before our faces. Rich. HI. 5: 3. 

What angel shall 
Bless this unworthy husband ? he cannot thrive 
Unless her prayers, whom Heaven delights to hear, 
And loves to grant, reprieve him from the wrath 
Of greatest justice. All's Well 3: 4. 

Pray can I not, 
Though inclination be as sharp as will ; . . . . 
And what's in prayer, but this two-fold force, — 
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall, 
Or pardon'd being down ? Then I'll look up ; 
My fault is past. But O, what form of prayer 
Can serve my turn? Ham. 5:5. 



That for his prey to pray he doth begin, 

As if the heaven should countenance his sin. . . . 

But in the midst of his unfruitful prayer, 

Having solicited the eternal power, 

That his foul thoughts might compass his fair fair, 

quoth he 

The powers to whom I pray abhor this fact, 

How can they then assist me in the act. Lucrece, St. 49, 50. 



208 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

PROVIDENCE 

We are in God's hands, brother. Hen. V. 3: 6. 

Heaven hath a hand in these events. Rich. II. 5: 2. 

There's such divinity doth hedge a king. Ham. 4: 5. 

There's a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. Ham. 5: 2. 

There's a divinity that shapes our ends, 
Rough-hew them how we will. Ham. 5: 2. 

He that doth the ravens feed, 

Yea, providently caters for the sparrow. As You Like It 2: 3. 

Virtue preserv'd from fell destruction's blast 

Led on by Heaven and crown'd with joy at last. Pericles 5: 3. 

. . . The grace of heaven 
Before, behind thee, and on every hand 
En wheel thee round ! Othello 2: 1. 

Arming myself with patience, 
To stay the providence of some high powers, 
That govern us below. Jul. Caesar 5: /. 

This was a venture, sir, that Jacob serv'd for ; 

A thing not in his power to bring to pass, 

But sway'd and fashion'd by the hand of Heaven. 

Mer. of Ven. 1:3. 
There is a tide in the affairs of men, 
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune : 
Omitted, all the voyage of their life 
Is bound in shallows and in miseries. Jul. Caesar 4: 3. 

By a divine instinct, men's minds mistrust 
Ensuing danger ; as by proof, we see 
The waters swell before a boist'rous storm 
But leave it all to God. Rich. III. 2: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 209 

The providence that's in a watchful state. . . , 

Finds bottom in the uncomprehensive deeps ; 

Keeps place with thought, and almost, like the gods, 

Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles. Troi. and Cres. 3: 5. 



PURITY— HONOR— COURAGE— RECTITUDE 

Heaven keep your honor safe! Me as. for Me as. 2: 2. 

If I lose mine honor I lose myself. Ant. and Cleo. 5: 4. 

A heart unspotted is not easily daunted. // Hen. VI. 3: 1. 

The valiant never taste of death but once. J id. Caesar 2: 2. 

Unstain'd thoughts do seldom dream on evil. Lucrece, St. 13. 

There is no time so miserable but a man may be true. Timon 4: j. 

Where I could not be honest 

I never yet was valiant. King Lear 5: 1. 

The trust I have is in mine innocence, 

And therefore am I bold and resolute. // Hen. VI. 4: 4. 

He's truly valiant that wisely suffers 

The worst that man can breathe. Timon 3:5. 

Mine honor is my life; both grow in one: 

Take honor from me and my life is done. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

To thine own self be true ; 

And it must follow, as the night the day, 

Thou can'st not then be false to any man. Ham. 1:3. 

His words are bonds, his oaths are oracles ; 
His love sincere, his thoughts immaculate ; 
His tears, pure messengers sent from his heart ; 
His heart as far from fraud as heaven from earth. Two Gent. 2: 7. 
14 



2io SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Mine honor keeps the weather of my fate : 

Life every man holds dear ; but the dear man 

Holds honor far more precious dear than life. Troi. and Cres. 5: 3. 

Tis the mind that makes the body rich ; 

And as the sun breaks through the darkest clouds, 

So honor peereth in the meanest habit. Tarn, of Shrew 4: 3. 

God forbid, . . . 
That you should fashion, wrest, or bow your reading, 
Or nicely charge your understanding soul 
With open titles miscreate (spurious). Hen. V. 1:2. 

Shall Caesar send a lie? 
Have I in conquest stretch'd mine arm so far, 
To be afeard to tell gray-beards the truth ? — 
Decius, go tell them Caesar will not come. Jul. Caesar 2: 2. 

Love thyself last; cherish those hearts that hate thee: 

Corruption wins not more than honesty. 

Still in thy hand carry gentle peace, 

To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not : 

Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's, 

Thy God's and Truth's. Hen. VIII. 3: 2. 

What is it that you would impart to me? 

If it be aught toward the general good, 

Set honor in one eye, and death i' the other: 

And I will look on both indifferently: 

For, let the gods so speed me as I love 

The name of honor more than I fear death. Jul. Caesar 1: 2. 

For I am arm'd so strong in honesty, 

That they pass by me as the idle wind, 

Which I respect not. I did send to you 

For certain sums of gold, which you denied me; 

For I can raise no money by vile means : 

By heaven, I had rather coin my heart, 

And drop my blood for drachmas, than to wring 

From the hard hands of peasants their vile trash, 

By any indirection. Jul. Caesar 4: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 211 

He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one : 

Exceeding wise, fair spoken, and persuading : 

Lofty, and sour, to them that lov'd him not ; 

But, to those men that sought him, sweet as summer. 

. . . And, to add greater honors to his age 

Than man could give him, he died fearing God. Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 

O ! that estates, degrees, and offices, 

Were not deriv'd corruptly; and that clear honor 

Were purchas'd by the merit of the wearer ! 

How many men then should cover, that stand bare ; 

How many commanded, that command : 

How much low peasantry would then be glean'd 

From the true seed of honor. Mer. of Ven. 2: p. 

The purest treasure mortal times afford 

Is spotless reputation ; that away, 

Men are but gilded loam, or painted clay. . . . 

Mine honor is my life ; both grow in one ; 

Take honor from me, and my life is done. 

Then, dear my liege, mine honor let me try ; 

In that I live, and for that will I die. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

Not a man, for being simply man, 
Hath any honor; but honor for those honors 
That are without him, as place, riches, favor, 
Prizes of accident as oft as merit : 
Which, when they fall, as being slippery standers, 
The love that lean'd on them, as slippery too, 
Doth one pluck down another, and together 
Die in the fall. Troi. and Cres. 5:5. 

Master, go on, and I will follow thee 
To the last gasp with truth and loyalty. 
From seventeen years, till now almost fourscore, 
Here lived I, but now live here no more. 
At seventeen years many their fortunes seek, 
But at fourscore it is too late a week: 
Yet fortune cannot recompense me better, 
Than to die well, and not my master's debtor. As You Like It 2: 3. 



212 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

It shall scarce boot me 
To say " Not guilty : " mine integrity, 
Being counted falsehood, shall, as I express it, 
Be so receiv'd. But thus : — If powers divine 
Behold our human actions, (as they do) 
I doubt not, then, but innocence shall make 
False accusation blush, and tyranny 
Tremble at patience. — You, my lord, best know, 
(Who least will seem to do so) my past life 
Hath been as continent, as chaste, as true, 
As I am now unhappy ; which is more 
Than history can pattern, though devis'd, 
And play'd to take spectators. For behold me, 
A fellow of the royal bed, which owe 
A moiety of the throne, a great king's daughter, 
The mother to a hopeful prince, here standing 
To prate and talk for life, and honor, 'fore 
Who please to come and hear. For life, I prize it 
As I weigh grief, which I would spare : for honor, 
'Tis a derivative from me to mine, 
And only that I stand for. Winter's Tale 3: 2. 

She dwells so securely on the excellency of her honor, that the folly 
•of my suit dares not present itself: she is too bright to be looked 
against. Merry Wives 2: 2. 

To be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of two 
thousand. Ham. 2:2. 

She is of so free, so kind, so apt, so blessed a disposition, that she 
holds it a vice in her goodness, not to do more than she is requested. 

Othello 2: j. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARB 213 

REDEMPTION— ATONEMENT 

Now, by the death of Him that died for all. // Hen. VI. 1: 1. 

... to renounce his baptism 
All seals and symbols of redeemed sin. Othello 2: 3. 

Why, all the souls that were forfeit once ; 
And He that might the vantage best have took 
Found out the remedy. Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

As surely as my soul intends to live 

With that dread king, that took our state upon him 

To free us from his Father's wrathful curse. 77 Hen. VI. 3: 2. 

I charge you as you hope to have redemption 

By Christ's dear blood, shed for our grievous sins 

That you depart and lay no hands upon me. Rich. III. 1:4. 

Renowned for their needs as far from home, 

(For Christian service, and true chivalry,) 

As is the sepulchre in stubborn Jewry 

Of the world's ransom, blessed Mary's son. Rich. II. 2: J. 

I every day expect an embassage 

From my Redeemer to redeem me hence; 

And more to peace my soul shall part to heaven, 

Since I have made my friends at peace on earth. Rich. III. 2: J. 

(See also Shakspeare's Will.) 



2U SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

RELIGIOUS VOWS AND OATHS 

Religious canons, civil laws are cruel. Timon 4: 3. 

He heard him swear and vow to God. I Hen. IV. 4: 3. 

Unheedful vows may needfully be broken. Two Gent. 2: 6. 

— With the divine forfeit of his soul upon oath. All's Well 3: 6. 

'Tis deadly sin to keep that oath 
And sin to break it. Love's Labor 2: 1. 

An oath, an oath, I have an oath in heaven : 

Shall I lay perjury on my soul ? Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

He hath given countenance to his speech 

With almost all the holy vows of Heaven. Ham. 1:3. 

— Having sworn too hard-a-keeping oath 

Study to break it, and not break my troth. Love's Labor 1: 1. 

And by our holy Sabbath have I sworn 

To have the due and perfect of my bond. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

. . . hold your vow. 
Nor God, nor I, delights in perjured men. Love's Labor 5: 2. 

. . . Do not break your oaths ; for of that sin 

My mild entreaty shall not make you guilty. 777 Hen. VI. 3: 1. 

And cracking the strong warrant of an oath, 

Mark'd with a blot, damn'd in the book of Heaven. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

It is the purpose that makes strong the vow 

But vows to every purpose must not hold. Troi. and Cres. 5: 3. 

By God's will ! . . . 

By Him that made me, I'll maintain my words 

On any plot of ground in Christendom. I Hen. VI. 2: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 215 

To keep that oath were more impiety 

Than Jephthah's when he sacrificed his daughter. /// Hen. VI. 5; 1. 

'Tis not the many oaths that make the truth 
But the plain single vow, that is vow'd true. 
What is not holy, that we swear not by 
But take the highest to witness. All's Well 4: 2. 

This, in the name of God, I promise here: 
The wish if He be pleased I shall perform, 
And I will die a hundred thousand deaths 
Ere break the smallest parcel of this vow. / Hen. IV. 3: 2. 

Married in league, coupled and link'd together 
With all religious strength of sacred vows. 
. . . O, let thy vow 
First make to heaven, first be to heaven perform'd. 
... It is religion that doth make vows kept 
But thou hast sworn against religion. King John 3: 1. 

I took an oath that he should quietly reign. 

But for a kingdom any oath may be broken : 

I would break a thousand oaths to reign one year. 

No ; God forbid your grace should be foresworn. 

. . . An oath is of no moment, being not took 

Before a true and lawful magistrate, 

That hath authority over him that swears. Ill Hen. VI. 1: 2. 

No, not an oath : if not the face of men, 
The sufferance of our souls, the time's abuse, 
If these be motives weak, break off betimes, 
And every man hence to his idle bed ; 

. . . what other oath, 
Than honesty to honesty engag'd, 
That this shall be, or we will fail for it? 

. . . unto bad causes swear 
Such creatures as men doubt; but do not stain 
The even virtue of our enterprise, 
Nor th' insuppressive mettle of our spirits, 
To think that, or our cause, or our performance, 
Did need an oath. Jul. Caesar 2: 1. 



216 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Canst thou dispense with Heaven for such an oath? 

It is a great sin to swear unto a sin, 

But greater sin to keep a sinful oath. 

Who can be bound by any solemn vow 

To do a murderous deed, to rob a man, 

To force a spotless virgin's chastity, 

To reave the orphan of his patrimony, 

To wring the widow from her custom'd right, 

And have no other reason for this wrong, 

But that he was bound by a solemn oath ? 77 Hen. VI. 5: I. 

Heaven's wrong is most of all. 
If thou didst fear to break an oath with him, 
The unity, the king my husband made 
Thou had'st not broken, nor my brothers died. 
If thou had'st fear'd to break an oath by him, 
The imperial metal, circling now thy head, 
Had grac'd the tender temples of my child ; 
And both the princes had been breathing here, 
Which now, two tender bed-fellows for dust, 
Thy broken faith hath made the prey for worms. 
What canst thou swear by now ? Rich. III. 4: 4. 

Luc. Whom should I swear by ? thou believ'st no God 
That granted, how canst thou believe an oath ? 

Aor. What if I do not, as indeed, I do not ; 
Yet, for I know thou art religious, 
And hast a thing within thee, called conscience, 
. . . Therefore I urge thy oath : — for that, I know, 
An idiot holds his bauble for a God, 
And keeps the oath which by that God he swears, 
To that I'll urge him. — Therefore, thou shalt vow 
By that same God, what God soe'er it be, 
That thou ador'st and hast in reverence. 

Luc. Even by my God I swear to thee, I will. Titus And. 5: J. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 217 

RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCE— WORSHIP 

You shall not only take the sacrament. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

Go bid the priests do present sacrifice. lul. Caesar 2:2. 

As we have taken the sacrament, 
We will unite the white rose and the red. Rich. III. 5:4. 

When holy and devout religious men 

Are at their beads, 'tis much to draw them thence ; 

So sweet is zealous contemplation. Rich. III. 3: J. 

Came to the altar : where she kneel'd, and, saint-like, 
Cast her fair eye to heaven, and pray'd devoutly. 

the choir, 

With all the choicest music of the kingdom, 
Together sung Te Deum. Hen. VIII. 4: 1. 

True is it that we have seen better days ; 
And have with holy bell been knoll'd to church; 
. . . and wip'd our eyes 
Of drops that sacred pity hath engender'd. (See Man.) 

As You Like It 2:7. 

Stoop boys : this gate 
Instructs you how t' adore the heavens, and bows you 
To a morning's holy office: the gates of monarchs 
Are arch'd so high, that giants may jet through 
And keep their impious turbands on, without 
Good-morrow to the sun. — Hail, thou fair heaven ! 
We house i' the rock Hail, Heaven! Cymb. 5:5. 

Hanging a golden stamp about their necks, 

Put on with holy prayers : and 'tis spoken 

To the succeeding royalty he leaves 

The healing benediction. With this strange virtue 

He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy. Macb. 4: 3- 



218 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Win. He was a king, bless'd of the King of kings. 
Unto the French the dreadful judgment day 
So dreadful will not be, as was his sight. 
The battles of the Lord of hosts he fought : 
The church's prayers made him so prosperous. 

Glo. The church! where is it? Had not churchmen pray'd, 
His thread of life had not so soon decay 'd : . . . 

Win. Thy wife is proud; she holdeth thee in awe, 
More than God, or religious churchmen may. 

Glo. Name not religion, for thou lov'st the flesh; 
And ne'er throughout the year to church thou go'st, 
Except it be to pray against thy foes. / Hen. VI. i: i. 



RELIGIOUS BELIEFS— PRACTICES— SUPERSTITIONS 

This hand of yours requires 
A sequester for liberty, fasting and prayer, 
Much castigation, exercise devout. Othello 3:4. 

That is a fair young maid that yet wants baptism, 
You must be godfather and answer for her. 

... I long 
To have this young one made a Christian. Hen. VIII. 5: 2. 

God in Heaven forbid 
We should infringe the holy privilege 
Of blessed sanctuary ! not for all this land 
Would I be guilty of so great a sin. Rich. III. 3: 1. 

Here's a prophet, that I brought with me 

From forth the streets of Pom fret, whom I found 

With many hundreds treading on his heels ; 

To whom he sung, in rude harsh-sounding rhymes, 

That ere the next Ascension-day at noon, 

Your highness should deliver up your crown. . . . 

Is this Ascension-day ? Did not the prophet 

Say that before Ascension-day at noon, 

My crown I should give off? Even so I have. 

I did suppose it should be on constraint ; 

But, heaven be thank'd, it is but voluntary. King John 4:2; 5: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARB 219 

. . . All his mind is bent to holiness, 

To number Ave-Marias on his beads: 

His champions are the prophets and apostles; 

His weapons, holy saws of sacred writ; 

His study is his tilt-yard, and his loves 

Are brazen images of canoniz'd saints. 

I would, the colleges of the cardinals 

Would choose him pope, and carry him to Rome, 

And set the triple crown upon his head: 

That were a state fit for his holiness. 77 Hen. VI. 1:3. 

Heaven and our gracious Lady hath it pleas'd 
To shine on my contemptible estate: . . . 
God's mother deigned to appear to me; 
And, in a vision full of majesty, 
Will'd me to leave my base vocation, 
And free my country from calamity. 

Stay, stay thy hands! thou art an Amazon, 
And fightest with the sword of Deborah. 
Christ's mother helps me, else I were too weak. 

Was Mahomet inspired with a dove? 

Thou with an eagle art inspired, then. 

Helen, the mother of great Constantine, 

Nor yet St. Philip's daughters were like thee. / Hen. VI. 1: 2. 

1 Clo. Is she to be buried in Christian burial, that wilfully seeks 
her own salvation? 

2 Clo. I tell thee, she is; and therefore make her grave straight: 
the crowner hath set on her, and finds it Christian burial. 

1 Clo. How can that be, unless she drowned herself in her own 
defence ? 

2 Clo. Why, 'tis found so. 

1 Clo. It must be se oifendendo; it cannot be else. For here lies 
the point: if I drown myself wittingly, it argues an act, and an act 
hath three branches; it is, to act, to do, and to perform: argal, she 
drowned herself wittingly. 

2 Clo. Nay, but hear you, goodman delver. 

1 Clo. Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: here stands the 
man ; good : if the man go to this water, and drown himself, it is, will 



220 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

he, nill he, he goes ; mark you that ? but if the water come to him, and 
drown him, he drowns not himself: argal, he that is not guilty of his 
own death shortens not his own life. 

2 Clo. But is this law? 

j Clo. Ay, marry, is't; crowner's quest-law. 

2 Clo. Will you ha' the truth on't? If this had not been a gentle- 
woman, she should have been buried out of Christian burial. 

i Clo. Why, there thou say'st; and the more pity, that great folk 
should have countenance in this world to drown or hang themselves, 
more than their even christian. Come, my spade. There is no ancient 
gentlemen but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers; they hold up 
Adam's profession. 

2 Clo. Was he a gentleman? 

i Clo. He was the first that ever bore arms. 

2 Clo. Why, he had none. 

i Clo. What, art a heathen ? How dost thou understand the Scrip- 
ture? The Scripture says, Adam digged: could he dig without 
arms? .... 

. . . r Priest. Her obsequies have been as far enlarg'd 
As we have warranty : her death was doubtful ; 
And, but that great command o'ersways the order, 
She should in ground unsanctified have lodg'd, 
Till the last trumpet; for charitable prayers, 
Shards, flints, and pebbles, should be thrown on her, 
Yet here she is allow'd her virgin rites, 
Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home 
Of bell and burial. 

Laer. Must there no more be done? 

i Priest. No more be done. 

We should profane the service of the dead, 
To sing sage requiem, and such rest to her 
As to peace-parted souls. Ham. 5: /. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 221 



REMORSE (See Conscience) 

The urging of that word, judgment, hath bred a kind of remorse in 
me. Rich. III. 1: 4. 

Unnatural deeds 
Do breed unnatural troubles : Infected minds 
To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets. 
More needs she the divine than the physician. Macb. 5: /. 

Yet here's a spot. 
Out, damned spot ! out, I say ! . . . . 
Here's the smell of blood still : all the perfumes 
Of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh ! oh ! oh ! 

Macb. 3: 1. 

That cardinal Beaufort is at point of death; 

For suddenly a grievous sickness took him, 

That makes him gasp, and stare, and catch the air, 

Blaspheming God, and cursing men on earth. 

Sometime he talks as if duke Humphrey's ghost 

Were by his side; sometime he calls the king, 

And whispers to his pillow, as to him, 

The secrets of his overcharged soul. 77 Hen. VI. 3:2. 

Better be with the dead, 
Whom we to gain our peace have sent to peace, 
Than on the torture of the mind to lie 
In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave; 
After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well ; 
Treason has done his worst: nor steel, nor poison, 
Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing 
Can touch him further! Macb. 3:2. 

.... Make thick my blood 
Stop up th' access and passage to remorse ; 
That no compunctious visitings of nature 
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between 
Th' effect and it. Come to my woman's breasts, 
And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers, 



222 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Wherever in your sightless substances 
,You wait on nature's mischief. Come, thick night, 
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell ! 
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes ; 
Nor heaven peep through the blankness of the dark, 
To cry, "Hold, hold!" Macb. 1:5. 

Where should Othello go? — 
Now, how dost thou look now? O ill-starr'd wench! 
Pale as thy smock ! when we shall meet at compt, 
This look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven, 
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl ; 
Even like thy chastity. — 
O, cursed, cursed slave ! — Whip me, ye devils, 
From the possession of this heavenly sight! 
Blow me about in winds ! roast me in sulphur ! 
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire ! 
O Desdemona! dead Desdemona! dead. Oh, oh! Othello 5:^. 

You are three men of sin, whom destiny 
(That hath to instrument this lower world, 
And what is in't) the never-surfeited sea 
Hath caused to belch up, and on this island 
Where man doth not inhabit; you 'mongst men 

Being most unfit to live 

O, it is monstrous ! monstrous ! 
Methought, the billows spoke, and told me of it; 
The winds did sing it to me; and the thunder, 
That deep and dreadful organ-pipe, pronounc'd 
The name of Prosper : it did base my trepass. 

. . . their great guilt 
Like poison given to work a great time after, 
Now 'gins to bite the spirits. Tempest 3: J. 

What if this cursed hand 
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood, 
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens, 
To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy, 
But to confront the visage of offence? 
And what's in prayer, but this two-fold force, — 
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall, 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 223 

Or pardon'd, being down? Then, I'll look up: 

My fault is past. But, O ! what form of prayer 

Can serve my turn? Forgive me my foul murder! — 

That cannot me; since I am still possess'd 

Of those effects for which I did the murder, 

My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen. 

May one be pardon'd, and retain th' offence? 

In the corrupted currents of this world, 

Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice; 

And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself 

Buys out the law: But 'tis not so above. Ham. 3: 3. 

Have mercy Jesu ! — Soft ; I did but dream. 

O, coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me ! — 

The light burns blue. — It is now dead midnight. 

Cold fearful drops stand on my trembling flesh. 

What do I fear? myself? there's none else by: 

Richard loves Richard; that is, I am I. 

Is there a murderer here ? No ; — yes ; I am : 

Then fly, — What, from myself? Great reason: why? 

Lest I revenge. What! Myself upon myself? 

Alack ! I love myself. Wherefore ? for any good, 

That I myself have done unto myself? 

! no : alas ! I rather hate myself, 
For hateful deeds committed by myself. 

1 am a villain. Yet I lie ; I am not. 

Fool, of thyself speak well : — Fool, do not flatter : 

My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, 

And every tongue brings in a several tale, 

And every tale condemns me for a villain. 

Perjury, foul perjury, in the high'st degree; 

Murder, stern murder, in the dir'st degree : 

All several sins, all us'd in each degree, 

Throng to the bar, crying all, — Guilty ! guilty ! 

I shall despair. — There is no creature loves me; 

And if I die, no soul shall pity me : — 

Nay, wherefore should they? since that I myself 

Find in myself no pity to myself. 

Methought, the souls of all that I had murder'd 

Came to my tent ; and every one did threat 

To-morrow's vengeance on the head of Richard. Rich. III. 5: 5. 



224 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

REPENTANCE— PENITENCE 

Woe, that too late repents! King Lear 1:4. 

God of his mercy, give you . . . true repentance. Hen. V. 2:2. 

Is't enough I am sorry? . . . 
Must I repent? Cymb. 5:4. 

I do repent me as it is an evil 

And like the shame with joy. Meas. for Meas. 2: 3. 

Men shall deal unadvisedly sometimes, 

Which after-hours give leisure to repent. Rich. III. 4: 4. 

Our purposes God justly hath discover'd ; 

And I repent my fault more than my death. Hen. V. 2: 2. 

The breath of heaven hath blown his spirit out, 

And strew'd repentant ashes on his head. King John 4: 1. 

I repent. There is no sure foundation set on blood ; 

No certain life achiev'd by other's death. King John 4: 2. 

Fear, and not love, begets his penitence. 

Forget to pity him, lest thy pity prove 

A serpent that will sting thee to the heart. Rich. II. 5:3. 

Who by repentance is not satisfied 

Is not of heaven, nor earth; for these are pleas'd; 

By penitence the Eternal's wrath's appeased. Two Gent. 5: 4. 

I'll teach you how you shall arraign your conscience, 
And try your penitence, if it be sound, 
Or hollowly put on. . . . but lest you do repent, 
As that the sin hath brought you to this shame ; 
Which sorrow is always toward ourselves, not heaven; 
Showing, we would not serve heaven, as we love it, 
But as we stand in fear. Meas. for Meas. 2:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 225 

I am sorry that such sorrow I procure: 

And so deep sticks it in my penitent heart, 

That I crave death more willingly than mercy 

'Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it. Me as. for Meas. 5: 1. 

Try what repentance can: what can it not? 
Yet what can it, when one cannot repent? 
O wretched state! O bosom, black as death! 
O limed soul, that struggling to be free, 
Art more engaged! Ham. 3:3. 

The breath no sooner left his father's body 
But that his wildness, mortified in him, 
Seem'd to die too : yea, at that very moment, 
Consideration like an angel came, 
And whipp'd the offending Adam out of him ; 
Leaving his body as a paradise. Hen. V. 1: 1. 

You . . . have per form 'd 
A saint-like sorrow ; no fault could you make 
Which you have not redeem'd; indeed, paid down 
More penitence than done trespass ! At the last 
Do, as the Heavens have done ; forget your evil ; 
With them, forgive yourself. Winter's Tale 5: 1. 

. . . Full of repentance, 
Continual meditations, tears and sorrows : 
He gave his honors to the world again, 
His blessed part to heaven, and slept in peace. . . . 
And to add greater honors to his age 
Than man could give, he died fearing God. Hen. VIII. 4: 2. 



Mother, for love of grace, 
Lay not that flattering unction to your soul, 
That not your trespass, but my madness speaks : 
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place, 
Whilst rank corruption, mining all within, 
Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven; 
Repent what's past ; avoid what is to come ; 
15 



226 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

And do not spread the compost on the weeds, 

To make them ranker. Forgive me this my virtue; 

For in the fatness of these pursy times, 

Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg ; 

Yes, curb and woo, for leave to do him good. Ham. 3:4. 

Lord ! — O ! not to-day, think not upon the fault 
My father made in compassing the crown. 

1 Richard's body have interred new, 

And on it have bestow'd more contrite tears, 
Than from it issued forced drops of blood. 
Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay, 
Who twice a day their wither'd hands hold up 
Toward heaven, to pardon blood ; and I have built 
Two chantries, where the sad and solemn priests 
Sing still for Richard's soul. More will I do; 
Though all that I can do is nothing worth, 
Since that my penitence comes after all, 
Imploring pardon. Hen. V. 4: 1. 

Well I'll repent, and that suddenly, while I am in some liking; I 
shall be out of heart shortly, and then I shall have no strength to 
repent. And I have not forgotten what the inside of a church is made 
of, I am a peppercorn, a brewer's horse: the inside of a church! 
Company, villainous company, hath been the spoil of me. 

I Hen. IV. 3:3. 



REVENGE— CURSES— HATE 

If you will have revenge from hell you shall. Titus And. 4: 3. 

Can curses pierce the clouds, and enter heaven? Rich. III. 1:3. 

Hope of revenge shall hide our inward woe. Troi. and Cress. 5:11. 

Can vengeance be pursu'd further than death? Rom. and Jul. 5: 3 

I am Revenge, sent from the infernal Kingdom 

To ease the gnawing vulture of thy mind, 

By working wreak ful vengeance on thy foes. Titus And. 5: 2. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 227 

Curses never pass 
The lips of those that breathe them in the air. Rich. III. 1:3. 

Vengeance is in my heart, death in my hand, 

Blood and revenge are hammering in my head. Titus And. 2: 3. 

Beyond the infinite and boundless reach 
Of mercy, if thou didst this deed of death, 
Art thou damn'd. King John 4: 3. 

Heaven's is the quarrel ; . . . 

Let heaven revenge : for I may never lift 

An angry arm against his minister. Rich. II. 2: 2. 

To see this sight, it irks my very soul. 

Withold revenge, dear God ! 'tis not my fault, 

Nor wittingly have I infring'd my vow. Ill Hen. VI. 2:2. 

. . . Revenge upon you all 
And in that hope I throw mine eyes to heaven 
Scorning whate'er you can afflict me with. 777 Hen. VI. 1:4. 

The guilt of conscience take thou for thy labor, 
But neither my good word, nor princely favor : 
With Cain go wander through the shade of night, 
And never shew thy head by day nor light. Rich II. 5: 6. 

Avaunt, thou dreadful minister of hell ! 

Thou hadst but power over this mortal body. . . . 

Foul devil, for God's sake, hence, and trouble us not; 

For thou hast made the happy earth thy hell. Rich. III. 1: 2. 

O God, which this blood mad'st, revenge his death ! 
O earth, which this blood drink'st, revenge his death ! 
Either, Heaven, with lightning strike the murderer dead ; 
Or earth, gape open wide and eat him quick. Rich. III. 1: 2. 

Here on my knees I vow to God above, 

I'll never pause again, never stand still, 

Till either death hath clos'd these eyes of mine, 

Or fortune given me a measure of revenge. Ill Hen. VI. 2:3. 



228 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Not on thy sole, but on thy soul, harsh Jew, 

Thou mak'st thy knife keen ; but no metal can, 

No, not the hangman's axe, bear half the keenness 

Of thy sharp envy. Can no prayers pierce thee? Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

Curs'd be that heart that forc'd us to this shift! 

Write thou, good niece, and here display at last, 

What God will have discover'd for revenge. 

Heaven guide thy pen to print thy sorrows plain, 

That we may know the traitors and the truth. Titus And. 4: 1. 

And by our holy Sabbath have I sworn, 
To have the due and forfeit of my bond: 
You'll ask me, why I rather choose to have 
A weight of carrion flesh, than to receive 
Three thousand ducats: I'll not answer that: 
But, say, it is my humor. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

O villains, vipers, damn'd without redemption! 
Dogs, easily won to fawn on any man ! 
Snakes, in my heart-blood warm'd, that sting my heart! 
Three Judases, each one thrice worse than Judas! 
Would they make peace? terrible hell make war 
Upon their spotted souls for this offence. Rich. II. 5: 2. 

Thou shalt stand curs'd, and excommunicate 
And blessed shall he be, that doth revolt 
From his allegiance to an heretic ; 
And meritorious shall that hand be call'd, 
Canonized and worship'd as a saint, 
That takes away by any secret course 
Thy hateful life. King John 5: 1. 

If heaven have any grievous plague in store, 

Exceeding those that I can wish upon thee, 

O ! let them keep it, till thy sins be ripe, 

And then hurl down their indignation 

On thee, the troubler of the poor world's peace ! 

The worm of conscience still be-gnaw thy soul ! 

Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou liv'st, 

And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends! Rich. III. 1:3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 229 

Now might I do it, pat, now he is praying; 
And now I'll do 't: — and so he goes to heaven, 
And so am I reveng'd? That would be scann'd: 
A villain kills my father ; and for that, 
I, his sole son, do this same villain send to heaven. 
Why, this is hire and salary, not revenge. 
He took my father grossly, full of bread; 
With all his crimes broad blown, as fresh as May, 
And how his audit stands, who knows, save heaven? 
But, in our circumstance and course of thought, 
'Tis heavy with him; and am I then reveng'd, 
To take him in the purging of his soul, 
When he is fit and season'd for his passage? — No. 
Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid bent. 
When he is drunk, asleep, or in his rage; 
Or in th' incestuous pleasures of his bed ; 
At gaming, swearing ; or about some act, 
That has no relish of salvation in 't; 
Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven, 
And that his soul may be as damn'd, and black, 
As hell, whereto it goes. Ham. 3:3. 

If it will feed nothing else it will feed my revenge. . . If you wrong 
us, shall we not revenge? ... If a Jew wrong a Christian, what 
is his humility? revenge: If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his 
sufferance be by Christian example? why, revenge. Mer. of Ven. 3:1. 



SALVATION 

Relent, and save your souls. Rich. III. 1: 4. 

In the course of justice, none of us 
Should see salvation. Mer. of Ven. 4: 1. 

Heaven's above all, and there be souls must be 

Saved, and there be souls must not be saved. Othello 2: 3. 

As surely as my soul intends to live 

With that dread King, that took our state upon him 

To free us from his Father's wrathful curse. 77 Hen. VI. 3: 2. 



230 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

— It were pity but they should suffer salvation, body and soul. 

Much Ado 3: 3. 

The means that heaven yields must be embrac'd 

And not neglected; else if heaven would, 

And we will not, heaven's offer we refuse. Rich. II. 3: 2. 



SATAN— DEVIL 

Th' eternal Devil to keep his state. Jul. Caesar 1:2. 

No man means evil but the devil. Merry Wives 5: 2. 

By the devil's illusions the monk might be deceiv'd. Hen. VIII. i: 2. 

There is a good angel about him ; but the devil outbids him too. 

// Hen. IV. 2: 4. 

Let me say Amen betimes, lest the devil cross my prayer. 

Mer. of Ven. 3: 1. 

Nay, if the devil have given thee proof for sin 
Thou wilt prove his. Meas. for Meas. 3:2. 

The black prince, alias, the prince of darkness; 
Alias, the devil. All's Well 4: 5. 

An angel is not evil ; 
I should have fear'd her had she been a devil. Love's Labor 5: 2. 

. . . Let the devil 
Be sometime honor 'd for his burning throne. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 

. . . Shame the devil, 
By telling truth ; Tell truth, and shame the devil. / Hen. IV. 3: 1. 

. . . Are you a man? 
Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that which might appal the 
devil. Macb. 3:4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 231 

I'll call for clubs, if you will not away: — 

This cardinal is no more haughty than the devil. / Hen. VI. I: J. 

No, he's in Tartar limbo, worse than hell 
A devil in an everlasting garment hath him fell, 
One whose hard heart is button'd up with steel; 
Who knows no touch of mercy ; cannot feel, 
A fiend, a fury, pitiless and rough; 
A wolf, nay, worse, a fellow all in buff; 
A back-friend, a shoulder-clapper, one that countermands 
The passages and alleys, creeks and narrow lands: 
A hound that runs counter, and yet draws dry-foot well; 
One that, before the judgment, carries poor souls to hell. 

Com. of Err. 4:2. 

I would it were hell-pains for thy sake, and my poor doing eternal: 

. he is my good lord ; whom I serve above is my master. 
Who? God? 
Ay, sir. 
The devil it is, that's thy master. All's Well 2: 5. 

. . . How agrees the devil and thee about thy soul, that thou soldest 
him? .... the devil shall have his bargain; for he was never yet a 
breaker of proverbs, — he will give the devil his due. / Hen. IV. 1: 2. 

Satan, avoid ! I charge thee, tempt me not ! 

Master, is this mistress Satan? 

It is the devil. 

Nay, she is worse, she is the devil's dam; ... It is written, they 
appear to men like angels of light : light is an effect of fire, and 
fire will burn. . . . Marry, he must have a long spoon that must 
eat with the devil. . . . 

I charge thee, Satan, hous'd within this man, 

To yield possession to my holy prayers, 

And to thy state of darkness hie thee straight: 

I conjure thee by all the saints in heaven. Com. of Brr. 4: 3. 



232 SCRIPTURE THUMBS IN SHAKSPBARB 

SCRIPTURES, THE 

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose. Mer. of Ven. 1:3. 

How dost thou understand the Scriptures? 
The Scripture says, Adam digged. Ham. 5: 1. 

His champions are the prophets and Apostles ; 

His weapons, holy saws of sacred writ. II Hen. VI. 1:3. 

Trifles, light as air, 
Are to the zealous confirmation strong 
As proofs of holy writ. Othello 3: 3. 

The better sort — 
As thoughts of things divine — are intermixed 
With scruples, and do set forth the faith itself 
Against the faith. 1 Rich. II. 5:5. 

SIN— SINNERS 
Think on thy sins. Othello 5: 2. 
I know it is a sin to be a mocker. Mer. of Ven. 1: 2. 
God forgive the sin of all those souls. King John 2: 1. 
Nothing emboldens sin so much as mercy. Timon. 3:5. 
Who lives that's not depraved, or depraves. Timon 1:2. 
Thy sin's not accidental, but a trade. Meas. for Meas. 3:1. 
Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all. 77 Hen. VI. 5: 3. 
... If the devil have given thee proofs for sin. Meas. for Meas. 3: 2. 



1,1 The Faith " is used here in the sense of " The Word." (See Bishop Words- 
worth and others. - ) 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 233 

All offences come from the heart. Hen. V. 4:8. 

She is proud. . . It was Eve's legacy. Two Gent. 3: 1. 

So should I give consent to flatter sin. / Hen. VI. 5: 5. 

Sin ne'er gives a fee, — He gratis comes. Lucrece, St. 131. 

Heaven ! lay not my transgression to my charge. King John 1: 1. 

Wickedness is sin and sin is damnation. As You Like It 3:2. 

If it be a sin to make a true election she is damned. Cymb. 1: 3. 

Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall. Meas. for Meas. 2: 1. 

And he (bears) the burden of a guilty mind. Lucrece, St. 105. 

Self-love . . is not so vile a sin as self-neglecting. Hen. V. 2: 4. 

Look you, the sins of the father are to be laid upon the children. 

Mer. of Ven. 3: 5. 

... In thy orisons 
Be all thy sins remember'd. Ham. 3: 1. 

I am a man 
More sinned against than sinning. King Lear 5: 2. 

O, what authority and show of truth 

Can cunning sin cover itself withal. Much Ado 4: 1. 

O deeper sin than bottomless conceit 

Can comprehend in still imagination. Lucrece, St. 101. 

But no perfection is so absolute 

That some impurity doth not pollute. Lucrece, St. 122. 

You are a made old man ; if the sins of 

Your youth are forgiven you, you're well to live. 

Winter's Tale 3: 3. 



234 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

I do see the very book indeed 
Where all my sins are writ, and that's myself. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

And in thy shady cell, where none may spy him, 

Sits sin, to seize the souls that wander by him. Lucrecc, St. 126. 

. . . Self-love, which is the most inhibited (forbidden) sin in the 
canon. All's Well 1: 1. 

. . . Only sin 
And hellish obstinacy tie thy tongue, 
That truth should be suspected. All's Well 1: 3. 

What sin you do to save a brother's life, 

Nature dispenses with the deed so far, 

That it becomes a virtue. Meas. for Meas. 3: 1. 

An accessory by thine inclination 

To all sins past, and all that are to come, 

From the creation to the general doom. Lucrece, St. 132. 

Have you a ruffian that will swear, drink, dance, 

Revel the night ; rob, murder and commit 

The oldest sins the newest kind of ways? 77 Hen. IV. 4: 4. 

The blackest sin is clear'd with absolution; . . . 

The eye of heaven is out, and misty night 
Covers the shame that follows sweet delight. Lucrece, St. 57. 

So from himself impiety hath wrought, 

That for his prey to pray he doth begin, 

As if the heaven should countenance his sin. Lucrece, St. 49. 

Men's faults do seldom to themselves appear; 

Their own transgressions partially they smother: 

This guilt would seem death-worthy in thy brother. Lucrece, St. pi. 

I grant him bloody, 
Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, 
Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin 
That has a name. Macb. 4: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 235 

If I in act, consent, or sin of thought 
Be guilty of the stealing that sweet breath, 
Which was embounded in this beauteous clay, 
Let hell want pains enough to torture me. 
I left him well. King John 4: 3. 

Where's that palace whereinto foul things 
Sometimes intrude not? who has a breast so pure 
But some uncleanly apprehensions 
Keep leets and law-days, and in sessions sit 
With meditations lawful? Othello 3: 3. 

Thy sins are visited in this poor child ; 

The canon of the law is laid on him, 

Being but the second generation 

Removed from thy sin-conceiving womb. 

. . . he's not only plagued for her sin 

But God hath made her sin and her the plague. King John 2: 1. 

For he's no man on whom perfections wait, 

That, knowing sin within, will touch the gate. 

You're a fair viol, and your sense the strings, 

Who, finger'd to make man his lawful music, 

Would draw heaven down and all the gods to hearken; 

But being play'd upon before your time, 

Hell only danceth to so harsh a chime. . . . 

Few love to hear the sins they love to act ; . . . 

How courtesy would seem to cover sin, 
When what is done is like an hypocrite, 
The which is good in nothing but in sight. Pericles I: I. 

O, how hast thou with jealousy infected 
The sweetness of affiance ! Show men dutiful ? 
Why, so didst thou: seem they grave and learned? 
Why, so didst thou : come they of noble family ? 
Why, so didst thou: seem they religious? 
Why, so didst thou : or are they spare in diet ; 
Free from gross passion, or of mirth or anger ; 
Constant in spirit, not swerving with the blood; 
Garnish'd and deck'd in modest complement; 
Not working with the eye without the ear, 



236 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

And but in purged judgment trusting neither? 
Such, and so finely bolted, didst thou seem; 
And thus thy fall hath left a kind of blot, 
To mark the full-fraught man, and best indued, 
With some suspicion. I will weep for thee, 
For this revolt of thine, methinks, is like 
Another fall of man. Hen. V. 2: 2. 

I am myself indifferent honest; but yet I could accuse me of such 
things, that it were better, my mother had not borne me. I am very 
proud, revengeful, ambitious; with more offences at my back, than I 
have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time 
to act them in. What should such fellows as I do, crawling between 
heaven and earth ? We are arrant knaves, all ; believe none of us. 

Ham. 3: J. 



SIN, INSECURITY AND EFFECTS OF 

Sin, death, and hell have set their marks on him ; 
And all their ministers attend on him. Rich. III. 1:3. 

. . . They say, blood will have blood ; 
Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak. Macb. 3: 4. 

But O ! it presses to my memory, 

Like damned guilty deeds to sinner's minds. Rom. and Jul. 3: 2. 

Alack ! when once our grace we have forgot 
Nothing goes right: we would, and we would not. 

Me as. for Me as. 4: 4. 

. . . The times conspire with you: 
For he that steeps his safety in true blood 
Shall find but bloody safety, and untrue. King John 3: 4. 

Oh, sirs, consider, they that set you on 

To do this deed will hate you for the deed. . . . 

Well, I'll go hide this body in some hole, 

Till that the duke give order for his burial ; 

And when I have my meed, I will away; 

For this will not, and then I must not stay. Rich. III. 1: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 237 

To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is, 

Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss: 

So full of artless jealousy is guilt, 

It spills itself, in fearing to be spilt. Ham. 4: 5. 

The flesh being proud, desire doth fight with grace, 
For there it revels; and when that decays, 
The guilty rebel for remission prays. 

So fares it with this faultful lord of Rome, 

Who this accomplishment so hotly chased ; 

For now against himself he sounds this doom, 

That through the length of times, he stands disgrac'd: 

Besides, his soul's fair temple is defac'd ; 

To whose weak ruins muster troops of cares, 

To ask the spotted princess how she fares. 

She says, her subjects with foul insurrection 
Have batter'd down her consecrated wall, 
And by their mortal fault brought in subjection 
Her immortality, and made her thrall 
To living death, and pain perpetual: 

Which in her prescience she controlled still, 

But her foresight could not fore-stall their will. 

(See Lust.) Lucrece, St. 102-104. 



SIN, TENDENCY AND DECEITFULNESS OF 

One sin, I know, another doth provoke; 

Murder's as near to lust as flame to smoke. Pericles 1: 1. 

Sometimes we are devils to ourselves, 

When we will tempt the frailty of our powers, 

Presuming on their changeful potency. Troi. and Cres. 4: 4. 

Heaven in thy creation did decree 
That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell ; 
Whate'er thy thoughts or thy heart's workings be, 
Thy looks should nothing thence but sweetness tell. 
How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow, 
If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show ! Sonnet 93. 



238 SCRIPTURE, THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

I am in 
So far in blood, that sin will pluck on sin. Rich. III. 4: 2. 

God, what mischiefs work the wicked ones ; 

Heaping confusion on their own heads thereby ! 77 He n. VI. 2: 1. 

What rein can hold licentious wickedness 

When down the hill he holds his fierce career? Hen. V. 3:3. 

.... To persist 
In doing wrong extenuates not wrong, 
But makes it much more heavy. Troi. and Ores. 2: 2. 

To kill, I grant, is sin's extremest gust ; 

But in defence, by mercy, 'tis most just. 

To be in anger is impiety; 

But who is man that is not angry? Timon 3:5. 

The king-becoming graces, 
As justice, verity, temperance, stableness, 
Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness, 
Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude, 

1 have no relish of them ; but abound 
In the division of each several crime, 

Acting it many ways. Nay, had I power, I should 
Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell, 
Uproar the universal peace, confound 
All unity on earth. Macb. 4:3. 

Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye, 

And all my soul, and all my every part ; 

And for this sin there is no remedy, 

It is so grounded inward in my heart. 

Methinks no face so gracious is as mine, 

No shape so true, no truth of such account ; 

And for myself mine own worth do define, 

As I all other in all worths surmount. 

But when my glass shows me myself indeed, 

Beated and chopp'd with tann'd antiquity, 

Mine own self-love quite contrary I read ; 

Self so self-loving were iniquity. 

'Tis thee (myself )that for myself I praise, 

Painting my age with beauty of thy days. Sonnet 62. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 239 

SLANDER— MALICE 

Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes. Ham. 1:3. 

Pierc'd to the soul with slander's venom'd spear. Rich. II. 1:1. 

Done to death by slanderous tongues 

Was the Hero that lies here. Much Ado 5:3. 

I have heard you preach 
That malice was a great and grievous sin. I Hen. VI. 3: 1. 

Slander lives upon succession; 

For ever housed, where it gets possession. Com. of Brr. 3: 1. 

Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape 
calumny. Ham. 3: 1. 

God forbid any malice should prevail, 

That faultless may condemn a nobleman! 

Pray God he may acquit him of suspicion. 77 Hen. VI. 3: 2. 

What, cardinal, is your priest-hood grown peremptory? 
Tantaene animis coelestibus iraef 
Churchmen so hot ? good uncle, hide such malice ; 
With such holiness can you do it? II Hen. VI. 2: 1. 

O, let my sovereign turn away his face, 
And bid his ears a little while be deaf, 
Till I have told this slander of his blood, 
How God, and good men, hate so foul a liar. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

That thou art blam'd shall not be thy defect, 

For slander's mark was ever yet the fair ; 

The ornament of beauty is suspect, 

A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. 

So thou be good, slander doth but approve 

Thy worth the greater, being woo'd of time ; 

For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love, 

And thou present'st a pure unstained prime. Sonnet jo. 



240 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

So, happy, slander, 
Whose whisper o'er the world's diameter, 
As level as the cannon to his blank, 
Transports his poison'd shot, may miss our name, 
And hit the woundless air. Ham. 4: 1. 

Traduced by ignorant tongues, ... let me say 
'Tis but the fate of place, and the rough brake 
That virtue must go through. We must not stint 
Our necessary actions, in the fear 
To cope malicious censurers. Hen. VIII. 1: 2. 

The shrug, the hum, or ha (these petty brands, 

That calumny doth use, — O, I am out ! — 

That mercy does, for calumny will sear 

Virtue itself) — these shrugs, these hums, and ha's, 

When you have said, "she's goodly," come between, 

Ere you can say "she's honest." Winter's Tale 2: 1. 

I say thou hast belied my innocent child ; 

Thy slander hath gone through and through her heart; 

And she lies buried with her ancestors: 

O ! in a tomb where never scandal slept, 

Save this of hers, fram'd by thy villainy, 

And she is dead, slander'd to death by villains. Much Ado 5: 1. 

Good name, in man, and woman, dear my lord, 
Is the immediate jewel of their souls: 

Who steals my purse, steals trash; 'tis something, nothing; 
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands ; 
But he, that filches from me my good name, 
Robs me of that, which not enriches him, 
And makes me poor indeed. Othello 3: 3. 

No ; 'tis slander, 
Whose edge is sharper than the sword ; whose tongue 
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile ; whose breath 
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie 
All corners of the world : kings, queens, and states, 
Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave 
This viperous slander enters. Cymb. 3:4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 241 

No might nor greatness in mortality 

Can censure 'scape; back-wounding calumny 

The whitest virtue strikes; What king so strong, 

Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue ! Meas. for Meas. 3: 2. 

If thou dost slander her, and torture me, 
Never pray more : abandon all remorse ; 
On horror's head horrors accumulate; 
Do deeds to make heaven weep, all earth amaz'd, 
For nothing canst thou to damnation add, 
Greater than that. Othello 3: 3. 

Let heaven requite it with the serpent's curse, 

For if she be not honest, chaste, and true, 

There's no man happy ; the purest of their wives 

Is foul as slander. . . . 

... I will be hang'd, if some eternal villain, 

Some busy and insinuating rogue, 

Some cogging, cozening slave, to get some office, 

Have not devis'd this slander; I'll be hang'd else. Othello 4:2. 

O that I were a man ! — What ! bear her in hand until they come to 
take hands ; and then with public accusation, uncovered slander, unmiti- 
gated rancour,— O God, that I were a man ! I would eat his heart in 
the market-place. Much Ado 4: 2. 



SORROW— GRIEF— SYMPATHY 

Sorrow ends not when it seemeth done. Rich. II. 1:2. 

Sweet are the uses of adversity. As You Like It 2: 1. 

He jests at scars that never felt a wound. Rom. and Jul. 2: 2. 

This sorrow's heavenly, 
It strikes where it doth love. Othello 5: 2. 

... It is a greater grief 
To bear love's wrong than hate's known injury. Sonnet 40. 
16 



242 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Great griefs, I see, medicine the less. Cymb. 4:2. 

One woe doth tread upon another's heel, 
So fast they follow. Ham. 4: 7. 

One sorrow never comes, but brings an heir, 
That may succeed, as his inheritor. Per. 1:4. 

When sorrows come, they come not single spies, 
But in battalions. Ham. 4: 5. 

Sorrow conceal'd, like an oven stopp'd, 

Doth burn the heart to cinders. Titus And. 2: 5. 

Give sorrow words : the grief that does not speak 

Whispers the o'er fraught heart, and bids it break. Macb. 4: 5. 

Sorrow breaks seasons and reposing hours; — 

Makes the night morning, and the noon-tide night. Rich. III. 1 : 4. 

But sorrow that is couch'd in seeming gladness 

Is like the mirth fate turns to sudden sadness. Troi. and Cres. 1: 1. 

Therefore be merry since sudden sorrow 

Serves to say thus: Some good thing comes to-morrow. 

/ Hen. IV. 4: 2. 

Wherever sorrow is, relief would be ; 
If you do sorrow at my grief in love, 
By giving love, your sorrow and my grief were both extermin'd. 

As You Like It 3:5. 

Sad souls are slain in merry company ; 

Grief best is pleas'd with grief's society ; 

True sorrow then is feelingly suffic'd 

When with like semblance it is sympathiz'd. Lucrece, St. 159. 

Who alone suffers, suffers most i' the mind, 

Leaving free things and happy shows behind ; 

But then the mind much sufferance doth o'erskip, 

When grief hath mates, and bearing fellowship. King Lear 3: 6. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 243 

Is not my sorrow deep, having no bottom ? 

. . . And be my heart an ever-burning hell : 

These miseries are more than may be borne. 

To weep with them that weep doth ease some deal ; 

But sorrow flouted at is double death. Titus And. 3: 1. 

Men can counsel, and speak comfort to that grief 

Which they themselves not feel : but tasting it 

Their counsel turns to passion, which before 

Would give preceptial medicine to rage, 

Fetter strong madness in a silken thread 

Charm ache with air, and agony with words. Much Ado 5: 1. 

'Tis sweet and commendable . . . 

In filial obligation for some term 

To do obsequious sorrow : But to persevere 

In obstinate condolement, is a course 

Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief: 

It shows a will most incorrect to heaven ; 

A heart unfortified, a mind impatient, 

An understanding simple and unschool'd. Ham. 1: 2. 

Grief fills the room up of an absent child, 
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me, 
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words, 
Remembers me of all his gracious parts, 
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form ; 
Then, have I reason to be fond of grief. 
Fare you well : had you such a loss as I, 

I could give better comfort than you do 

. . . O Lord ! my boy, my Arthur, my fair son ! 

My life, my joy, my food, my all the world ! 

My widow-comfort, and my sorrows' cure! King John 3: 4. 

There are numerous references to "God" and "Heaven" as the source 
of comfort and help in affliction. News is brought to Henry VI. that all 
his possessions in France were lost as a result of war and he exclaims : — 
"Cold news ; but God's will be done !" // Hen. VI. 3: 1. 

The Duke of Buckingham is informed that he is arrested on a charge 
of high treason and he answers : — "The will of heaven — 
Be done in this, and all things ! I obey." Hen. VIII. 1: 1. 



244 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

You do surely but bar the door upon your own liberty if you deny 
your griefs to your friends. Ham. j: 2. 

Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead ; excessive grief is the 
enemy of the living. All's Well 1: 1. 



SOUL 

O God! I have an ill-divining soul. Rom. and Jul. 3:5. 

My soul shall wait on thee to heaven. King John 5.' 7. 

. . . The immortal part needs a physician. 77 Hen. IV. 2: 2. 

. . . Take my soul: my body, soul, and all. I Hen. VI. 5: 5. 

O ! God defend my soul from such deep sin. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

Think'st thou I'll endanger my soul gratis? Merry Wives 2: 2. 

Every subject's duty is the king's; but every subject's soul is his own. 

Hen. V. 4: 1. 
I do in justice charge thee, — 
On thy soul's peril. Winter's Tale 2: 3. 

Banquo, thy soul's flight 
If it find heaven, must find it out to-night. Macb. 3: 2. 

Look, who comes here ! a grave unto a soul ; 

Holding the eternal spirit, against her will. King John 3:4. 

Her body sleeps in Capel's monument, 

And her immortal part with angels lives. Rom. and Jul. 5: 1. 

By heaven, he shall not have a Scot of them ; 

No, if a Scot would save his soul he shall not. I Hen. IV. 1: 5. 

I'll send some holy bishop to entreat, 

For God forbid, so many simple souls should perish by the sword ! 

// Hen. VI. 4: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 245 

Sweet rest to his soul ! — . . . Warwick bids 

You all farewell to meet in heaven. 777 Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

Whose soul is that which takes her heavy leave? 

A deadly groan, like life and death's departing. Ill Hen. VI. 2: 6. 

Heaven's above all ; and there be souls must be saved, and there be souls 
must not be saved. Othello 2: 3. 

I will deal in this 
As secretly and justly as your soul 
Should with your body. Much Ado 4:1. 

I do not set my life at a pin's fee ; 

And, for my soul, what can it do to that, 

Being a thing immortal as itself? Ham. 1: 4. 

He dives into the king's soul ; and there scatters 
Dangers, doubts, wringing of the conscience, 
Tears and despairs. Hen. VIII. 2: 2. 

For what I speak, 
My body shall make good upon this earth 
Or my divine soul answer it in heaven. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

This is All-Souls' day, is it not? 

By the false faith of him whom most I trusted 

This, this All-Souls' day to my fearful soul. Rich. III. 4: 1. 

Or by the worth of mine eternal soul. 
. . . O grace ! O heaven forgive me ! 
Are you a man ? have you a soul, or sense ? — 
God be wi' you. Othello 3: 3. 

Look how the floor of heaven 
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold. 
There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st 
But in his motion like an angel sings, 
Still 'quiring to the young-eyed cherubins : 
Such harmony is in immortal souls. Mer. of Ven. 5: /. 



2 4 6 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Isabel. I had rather give my body than my soul. 
Angelo. I talk not of your soul: Our compell'd sins 
Stand more for number than accompt. Me as. for Meas. 2: 4. 

I do love thee so, 
That I will shortly send thy soul to heaven 
If heaven will take the present at our hands. Rich. III. 1: I. 

It is too late ! the life of all his blood 

Is touch'd corruptly ; and his pure brain 

(Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-house) 

Doth by the idle comments that it makes 

Foretell the ending of mortality 

. . . 'Tis strange, that death should sing. 

I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan, 

Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death ; 

And from the organ-pipe of frailty, sings 

His soul and body to their lasting rest. . . . 

And then my soul shall wait on thee to heaven, 

As it on earth hath been thy servant still. King John 5: 7. 

(See also Sonnet 146 at close of chapter on Immortality — Book 
Third.) 

SUICIDE 

O that the everlasting had not fix'd 

His canon 'gainst self slaughter! Ham. 1:2. 

But life, being weary of these worldly bars, 

Never lacks power to dismiss itself. Jul. Caesar 1: J. 

Against self slaughter 
There is a prohibition so divine 
That cravens my weak hand. Cymb. j: 4. 



For who would bear the whips and scorns of time. . . 

When he himself might his quietus make 

With a bare bodkin ? Who would these fardels bear, 

To grunt and sweat under a weary life ; 

But that the dread of something after death ! Ham. 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 247 

Then is it sin 
To rush into the secret house of death, 
Ere death dare come to us? Ant. and Cleo. 4: 13. 

Wilt thou slay thyself, 
And slay thy lady, too, that lives in thee, 
By doing damned hate upon thyself? 
Why rail'st thou on thy birth, the heaven, and earth? 
Since birth, and heaven, and earth, all three do meet 
In thee at once, which thou at once wouldst lose. Rom. and Jul. 3:3. 

Even by the rule of that philosophy, 
By which I did blame Cato for the death 
Which he did give himself. I know not how, 
But I do find it cowardly and vile. 
For fear of what might fall, so to prevent 
The term of life, — arming myself with patience, 
To stay the providence of those high powers, 
That govern us below. Jul. Caesar 5: 1. 



TEMPTATION 

Had he been Adam, he had tempted Eve. Love's Labor 5: 2. 

Devils soonest tempt, resembling spirits of light. Love's Labor 4: 5. 

How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds 
Makes ill deeds done ! King John 4: 2. 

'Tis one thing to be tempted, 

Another thing to fall. Meas. for Meas. 2: 1. 

Shall I be tempted of the devil thus? 

Ay, if the devil tempt thee to do good. Rich. III. 4: 4. 

. . . the devil tempts thee here, 
In likeness of a new untrimmed bride. King John 3: 1. 

Withhold thine indignation, mighty heaven, 

And tempt us not to bear above our power ! King John 5: 6. 



248 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Know'st thou not any whom corrupting gold 

Would tempt unto a close exploit of death? Rich. III. 4: 2. 

Sometimes we are devils to ourselves, 

When we will tempt the frailty of our powers, 

Presuming on their changeful potency. Trot, and Cres. 4: 4. 

It is hypocrisy against the devil 

They that mean virtuously, and yet do so, 

The devil their virtue tempts, and they tempt heaven. Othello 4: 1. 

For I am that way going to temptation, 

Where prayers cross. 1 .... 
The tempter or the tempted, who sins most ? Ha 1 
Not she, nor doth she tempt ; but it is I, 
That lying by the violet in the sun, 
Do, as the carrion, not as the flower, 
Corrupt with virtuous season. Can it be, 
That modesty may more betray our sense 
Than woman's lightness ? Having waste ground enough, 
Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary, 
And pitch our evils there ? O, fie, fie, fie ! 
What dost thou, or what art thou, Angelo ? 
Dost thou desire her foully for those things 
That make her good ? O, let her brother live ! 
Thieves for their robbery have authority, 
When judges steal themselves. What ! do I love her, 
That I desire to hear her speak again, 
And feast upon her eyes ? What is 't I dream on ? 
O cunning enemy, that, to catch a saint 
With saints dost bait thy hook ! Most dangerous 
Is that temptation, that doth goad us on 
To sin in loving virtue. Meas. for Meas. 2: 2. 

Love is familiar ; love is a devil : there is no evil angel but love. Yet 
Samson was so tempted; and he had an excellent strength; yet was 
Solomon so seduced ; and he had a very good wit. Love's Labor 1: 2. 

1 "The petition of the Lord's Prayer, 'Lead us not into temptation,' is here 
considered as crossing or intercepting the way in which Angelo was going: he 
was exposing himself to temptation by the appointment for the morrow's meet- 
ing." Hudson's Notes on Shakspeare. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 249 



TESTIMONY OF THE DYING 

O but they say the tongues of dying men 

Enforce attention, like deep harmony; 

Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain ; 

For they breathe truth, that breathe their words in pain. 

He that no more must say, is listen'd more 

Than they whom youth and ease have taught to glose ; 

More are men's ends mark'd, than their lives before. Rich. II. 2: 1. 

Heaven has an end in all ; yet, you that hear me, 

This from a dying man receive as certain : 

Where you are liberal of your loves and counsels, 

Be sure, you be not loose ; for those you make friends, 

And give your hearts to, when they once perceive 

The least rub in your fortunes, fall away 

Like water from ye, never found again 

But when they mean to sink ye. All good people, 

Pray for me. I must now forsake ye : the last hour 

Of my long weary life is come upon me. 

Farewell: .... God forgive me. Hen. VIII. 2:1. 



TREASON— TREACHERY— BETRAYAL 

Trust not him that hath once broken faith. 77/ Hen. VI. 4: 4. 

Treason, and murther, ever kept together, 

As two yoke-devils sworn to either's purpose. Hen. V. 2: 2. 

My name 
Be yok'd with his that did betray the Best. 1 Winter's Tale 1: 2. 

Heaven guide thy pen to print thy sorrows plain, 

That we may know the traitors and the truth ! Titus And. 4: 1. 

Since God so graciously hath brought to light 
This dangerous treason. Hen. V. 2: 2. 

J The folio gives the word "Best" with a capital letter. The allusion is to 
Judas's betrayal of Jesus. 



?50 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

A kissing traitor: — How art thou prov'd Judas? Love's Labor 5: 2. 

Hath into monstrous habits put the graces 
That once were his, and is become as black 
As if besmear 'd in hell. Hen. VIII. 1: 2. 

And, by the grace of God, and this mine arm, 
To prove him, in defending of myself, 
A traitor to my God. Rich. II. 1: 3. 

Thus do all traitors; 
If their purgation did consist in words, 
They are as innocent as grace itself. As You Like It 1:3. 

His treasons will sit blushing in his face 

Not able to endure the sight of day, 

But, self-affrighted, tremble at his sin. Rich. II. 3: 2. 

Like a traitor coward, 
Sluic'd out his innocent soul through streams of blood : 
Which blood, like sacrificing Abel's, cries, 
Even from the tongueless caverns of the earth. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

This word rebellion, it had froze them up 

As fish are in a pond : But now the bishop 

Turns insurrection to religion: 

Suppos'd sincere and holy in his thoughts. 77 Hen. IV. 1: 1. 

I well remember 
The favors 1 of these men : were they not mine ? 
Did they not sometime cry, All hail ! to me? 
So Judas did to Christ ; but he, in twelve, 
Found truth in all, but one. Rich. II. 4: 1. 

What I speak 
My body shall make good upon this earth, 
Or my divine soul answer it in heaven. 
Thou art a traitor, and a miscreant ; 
Too good to be so, and too bad to live. Rich. II. 1: 1. 

1 Features. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 251 

If ever I were a traitor 
My name be blotted from the book of life, 
And I frcftn heaven banished as from hence ! 
But what thou art, heaven, thou, and I do know. Rich. II. 1:3. 

I promis'd you redress of these same grievances, 

Whereof you did complain ; which, by mine honor, 

I will perform with a most Christian care. 

But, for you, rebels, look to taste the due 

Meet for rebellion, .... 

Heaven, and not we hath safely fought to-day. — 

Some guard these traitors to the block of death : 

Treason's true bed, and yielder up of breath. 77 Hen. IV. 4: 2. 

K. Hen. Thus ever did rebellion find rebuke — 

did we not send grace, 

Pardon, and terms of love to all of you ? 

And wouldst thou turn our offers contrary? 

Misuse the tenor of thy kinsman's trust? 

Three knights upon our party slain to-day, 

A noble earl, and many a creature else, 

Had been alive this hour, 

If, like a Christian, thou hadst truly borne 

Betwixt our armies true intelligence. I Hen. IV. 5: 5. 

At what ease 
Might corrupt minds procure knaves, as corrupt, 
To swear against you? such things have been done: 
You are potently oppos'd, and with a malice 
Of as great size. Ween (think) you of better luck, 
I mean in perjur'd witness, than your Master, 
Whose minister you are, whiles here he liv'd 
Upon this naughty earth? Hen. VIII. 5: /. 

Ingrateful, savage, and inhuman creature ! 
Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels, 
That knew'st the very bottom of my soul, 
That almost mightst have coin'd me into gold, 
Wouldst thou have practie'd on me for thy use? 
May it be possible, that foreign hire 
•Could out of thee extract one spark of evil, 



252 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

That might annoy my finger ? 'tis so strange, 

That, though the truth of it stands off as gross 

As black and white, my eye will scarcely see it. 

Treason and murder ever kept together, 

As two yoke-devils sworn to either's purpose, 

Working so grossly in a natural course, 

That admiration did not whoop at them : 

But thou, 'gainst all proportion, didst bring in 

Wonder to wait on treason, and on murder : 

And whatsoever cunning fiend it was, 

That wrought upon thee so preposterously, 

Hath got the voice in hell for excellence, 

And other devils, that suggest by treasons, 

Do botch and bungle up damnation 

With patches, colors, and with forms, being fetch'd 

From glistening semblances of piety : 

But he that temper'd thee bade thee stand up, 

Gave thee no instance why thou shouldst do treason, 

Unless to dub thee with the name of traitor. 

. . . O, how hast thou with jealousy infected 

The sweetness of affiance ! Show men dutiful ? 

Why, so didst thou : seem they grave and learned ? 

Why, so didst thou : come they of noble family ? 

Why, so didst thou : seem they religious ? 

Why, so didst thou. Hen. V. 2: 2. 



TRUTH 
Truth hath a quiet breast. Rich. II. 1:3. 
Truth loves open dealing. Hen. VIII. 3: 1. 
Truth makes all things plain. Mid. Night Dr. 5." I. 
O wonderful, when devils tell the truth! Rich. III. 1:2. 
Delight no less in truth than life. Macb. 4: 3. 
Truth hath better deeds than words to grace it. Two Gent. 2: 2. 
There is no time so miserable, but a man may be true. Timon 4: 3. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 253 

To thine own self be true'; 
And it must follow, as the night the day, 
Thou can'st not then be false to any man. Ham. 1: 3. 

Methinks, the truth should live from age to age, 

As 'twere retail'd to all posterity, 

Even to the general all-ending day. Rich. HI. 3: 1. 

'Tis not the many oaths that make the truth ; 
But the plain single vow, that is vow'd true. 
What is not holy, that we swear not by, 
But take the Highest to witness. All's Well 4: 2. 

I can teach thee, to shame the devil, 

By telling truth ; Tell truth, and shame the devil. 

If thou hast power to raise him, bring him hither, 

And I'll be sworn I have power to shame him hence ; 

O, while you live, tell truth, and shame the devil. / Hen. IV. 3: 1. 

Truth is truth 

To the end of reckoning 

do not banish reason 

For inequality; but let your reason serve 

To make the truth appear where it seems hid ; 

And hide the false seems true. Me as. for Meas. 5: 1. 



VIRTUE— CHASTITY 

Virtue is chok'd with foul ambition. 77 Hen. VI. 3: 1. 

A heart unspotted is not easily daunted. II Hen. VI. 3: 7. 

He lives in fame that died in virtue's cause. Titus And. 1: 2. 

Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful. Meas. for Meas. 3: 1. 

In nature there's no blemish but the mind ; 

None can be call'd deform'd but the unkind. 

Virtue is beauty ; but the beauteous evil 

Are empty trunks, o'erflourished by the devil. Twelfth Night 3: 4. 



254 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie 

Which we ascribe to Heaven. All's Well i: I. 

Virtue, as it never will be mov'd 

Though lewdness court it in shape of heaven. Ham. 1:5. 

Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied ; 

And vice sometimes by action dignified. Rom. and Jul. 2: 3. 

Virtue, that transgresses, is but patched with sin ; and sin that amends, 
is but patched with virtue. Twelfth Night 1: 5. 

My chastity is the jewel of our house, 
Bequeathed down from many ancestors ; 
Which were the greatest obloquy i' the world 
In me to lose. All's Well 4: 2. 

If any wretch have put this in your head. 
Let heaven requite it with the serpent's curse ! 
For, if she be not honest, chaste, and true, 
There's no man happy, the purest of their wives 
Is foul as slander. Othello 4: 2. 

Thyself and thy belongings 
Are not thine own so proper, as to waste 
Thyself upon thy virtues, them on thee. 
Heaven doth with us, as we with torches do, 
Not light them for ourselves; for if our virtues 
Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike 
As if we had them not. Me as. for Meas. 1: 1. 

Were I under the terms of death, 
The impression of keen whips I'd wear as rubies, 
And strip myself to death, as to a bed 
That longing had been sick for, ere I'd yield 

My body up to shame 

Better it were a brother died at once, 
Than that a sister, by redeeming him, 

Should die forever 

Then, Isabel, live chaste, and, brother, die. 

More than our brother is our chastity. Meas. for Meas. 2: 4. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 255 

But heaven in thy creation did decree, 
That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell ; 
Whate'er thy thoughts or thy heart's workings be, 
Thy looks should nothing thence but sweetness tell 

How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow, 

If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show. 

They that have power to hurt, and will do none, 

That do not do the thing they most do show, 

Who, moving others, are themselves as stone. 

Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow ; 

They rightly do inherit heaven's graces, 

And husband nature's riches from expense, 

They are the lords and owners of their faces, 

Others but stewards of their excellence. Sonnet, St. 93, 94. 

I held it ever, 
Virtue and cunning were endowments greater 
Than nobleness and riches : careless heirs 
May the two latter darken and expend; 
But immortality attends the former, 
Making a man a god. Pericles 5: 2. 

Let not virtue seek 
Remuneration for the thing it was ! 
For beauty, wit, 

High birth, vigor of bone, desert in service. 
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all 
To envious and calumniating time. Troi. and Cres. 3: 5. 

Virtuous, and holy; chosen from above, 

By inspiration of celestial grace, 

To work exceeding miracles on earth. 

I never had to do with wicked spirits : 

But you, — that are polluted with your lusts, 

Stain'd with the guiltless blood of innocents, 

Corrupt and tainted with a thousand vices, — 

Because you want the grace that others have, 

You judge it straight a thing impossible 

To compass wonders, but by help of devils. 



256 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

No ; misconceived Joan of Arc hath been 

A virgin from her tender infancy, 

Chaste and immaculate in very thought; 

Whose maiden blood, thus rigorously effus'd, 

Will cry for vengeance at the gates of heaven. / Hen. VI. 5: 4. 

The hand that hath made you fair hath made you good : the goodness 
that is cheap in beauty makes beauty brief in goodness ; but grace being 
the soul of your complexion, should keep the body of it ever fair. 

Me as. for Me as. 3: 1. 



WAR 

There are few die well that die in a battle. Hen. V. 4: 1. 

The peace of Heaven is theirs that left their swords 
In such a just and charitable war. King John 2: 1. 

Richard, that robb'd the lion of his heart, 

And fought the holy wars in Palestine. King John 2: 1. 

How you awake the sleeping sword of war, 

We charge you in the name of God, take heed. Hen. V. 1:2. 

O war ! thou son of hell, 
Whom angry heavens do make their minister, 
Throw in the frozen bosoms of our part 
Hot coals of vengeance ! — Let no soldier fly. 
He that is truly dedicate to war, 
Hath no self-love ; nor he, that loves himself, 
Hath not essentially, but by circumstance, 
The name of valor. — O! let the vile world end. 77 Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

Now, let not nature's hand 
Keep the wild flood confin'd : let order die ; 
And let this world no longer be a stage, 
To feed contention in a lingering act, 
But let one spirit of the first-born Cain 
Reign in all bosoms, that, each heart being set 
On bloody courses, the rude scene may end, 
And darkness be the burier of the dead ! 77 Hen. IV. 1: 1. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 257 

In God's name cheerly on, courageous friends 

To reap the harvest of perpetual peace 

By this one bloody trial of sharp war. Rich. III. 5: 2. 

You, lord archbishop, 
Whose see is by a civil peace maintain'd ; 
Whose beard the silver hand of peace hath touch'd ; 
Whose learning and good letters peace hath tutor'd ; 
Whose white investments figure innocence, 
The dove and very blessed spirit of peace, — 
Wherefore do you so ill translate yourself, 
Out of the speech of peace, that bears such grace, 
Into the harsh and boisterous tongue of war? 
Turning your books to graves, your ink to blood, 
Your pens to lances, and your tongue divine 
To a loud trumpet, and report of war? 77 Hen. IV. 4: 1. 

The gates of mercy shall be all shut up ; 

And the flesh'd soldier, rough and hard of heart, 

In liberty of bloody hand shall range 

With conscience wide as hell, mowing like grass 

Your fresh fair virgins, and your flowering infants, 

What is it then to me, if impious war, 

Array'd in flames like to the prince of fiends, 

Do, with his smirch'd complexion, all fell feats 

Enlink'd to waste and desolation ? 

What is 't to me, when you yourselves are cause, 

If your pure maidens fall into the hand 

Of hot and forcing violation ? 

What rein can hold licentious wickedness, 

When down the hill he holds his fierce career ? 

The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand 

Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters; 

Your fathers taken by the silver beards, 

And their most reverend heads dash'd to the walls ; 

Your naked infants spitted upon pikes, 

Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confus'd 

Do break the clouds, as did the wives of Jewry 

At Herod's bloody-hunting slaughtermen. Hen. V. j: J. 

17 



258 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

If I demand 

What rub, or what impediment, there is, 

Why that the naked, poor, and mangled peace, 

Dear nurse of arts, plenty, and joyful births, 

Should not in this best garden of the world, 

Our fertile France, lift up her lovely visage ? 

Alas ! she hath from France too long been chas'd, 

And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps, 

Corrupting in its own fertility. 

Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart, 

Unpruned dies : her hedges even-pleached, 

Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair, 

Put forth disorder'd twigs : . . . . 

And as our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges, 

Defective in their natures, grow to wildness ; 

Even so our houses, and ourselves, and children, 

Have lost, or do not learn, for want of time, 

The sciences that should become our country, 

But grow, like savages, — as soldiers will, 

That nothing do but meditate on blood, — 

To swearing, and stern looks, diffus'd attire, 

And everything that seems unnatural. Hen. V. 5: 2. 

This battle fares like to the morning's war, 
When dying clouds contend with growing light ; 
What time the shepherd, blowing of his nails, 
Can neither call it perfect day nor night. 
Now sways it this way, like a mighty sea 
Forc'd by the tide to combat with the wind : 
Now sways it that way, like the self-same sea 
Forc'd to retire by fury of the wind : 
Sometime, the flood prevails ; and then, the wind, 
Now, one the better, then, another best ; 
Both tugging to be victors, breast to breast, 
Yet neither conqueror, nor conquered : 
So is the equal poise of this fell war. 
Here, on this molehill, will I sit me down. 
To whom God will, there be the victory ; 

... if God's good will were so; 
For what is in this world but grief and woe ? 
. . . Who's this ? — O God ! it is my father's face, 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 259 

Whom in this conflict I unawares have kill'd. 
O heavy times, begetting such events ! 
Pardon me, God, I knew not what I did ; — 
And pardon, father, for I knew not thee. — 
My tears shall wipe away these bloody marks, 
And no more words, till they have flow'd their fill 
O piteous spectacle ! O bloody times ! 
Whiles lions war and battle for their dens, 
Poor harmless lambs abide their enmity. 
Weep, wretched man, I'll aid thee, tear for tear, 
And let our hearts and eyes, like civil war, 
Be blind with tears, and break o'ercharg'd with grief. 
. ... Is this a foeman's face? 
Ah, no, no, no ! it is mine only son ! — l 
Ah, boy ! if any life be left in thee, 
Throw up thine eye : see, see, what showers arise, 
Blown with the windy tempest of my heart 
Upon thy wounds, that kill mine eye and heart ! — 
O, pity, God, this miserable age! — 
What stratagems, how fell, how butcherly, 
Erroneous, mutinous, and unnatural, 
This deadly quarrel daily doth beget ! — 
O boy ! thy father gave thee life too soon, 
And hath bereft thee of thy life too late. 777 Hen. VI. 2:5. 

There's not a soldier of us all, that, in the thanksgiving before meat, 
doth relish the petition well that prays for peace. Meas. for Meas. 1: 2. 

There is no king, be his cause never so spotless, if it comes to the 
arbitrement of swords, can try it out with all unspotted soldiers. Some, 
peradventure, have on them the guilt of premeditated and contrived 
murder; some, making the wars their bulwark, that have before gored 
the gentle bosom of peace with pillage and robbery. Now, if these men 
have defeated the law, and outrun native punishment, though they can 
outstrip men, they have no wings to fly from God : War is his beadle, 
war is his vengeance. Hen. V. 4: 1. 

x The dreadful incidents of war are most graphically portrayed in this scene. 
Especially pathetic are the above passages in which a son discovers his father 
whom he has slain and a father discovers that he has killed his only son. 



:oo SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPE 



WEALTH: ILL-GOTTEN— HOARDED (See Gold) 

If thou art rich, thou art p. 
For like an as? whose hack with ingots bows. 
Thou bear'st thy heavy riches but a journey. 
And death unloads thee. Meas. for Meas. 5: 1. 

. . . Didst thou never hear, 

That things ill got had ever bad success ? 

And happy always was it for that son. 

Whose father for his hoarding went to hell ? 

I'll leave my son my virtuous deeds behind, 

And would my father had left me no more : 

For all the rest is held at such a rate. 

As brings a thousand-fold more care to keep. 

Than in possession any jot of pleasure. 777 Her.. VI. 2:2. 

Those that much covet are with gain so fond, 

That what they have not. that which they possess. 

They scatter and unloose it from their bond. 

And so. by hoping more, they have but less : 

Or, gaining more, the profit of excess 
Is but to surfeit, and such griefs sustain. 
That they prove bankrupt in this poor rich gain. 

The aim of all is but to nurse the life 
With honor, wealth, and ease, in waning age ; 
And in this aim there is such thwarting strife, 
That one for all, or all for one we gage : 
As life for honor in fell battles' rage : 

Honor for wealth, and oft that wealth doth cost 

The death of all, and all together lost. 

So that in venturing ill, we leave to be 
The things we are for that which we expect ; 
And this ambitious foul infirmity. 
In having much, torments us with defect 
Of that we have : so then we do neglect 

The thing we have : and. all for want of wit. 

Make something nothing by augmenting it. Lucre ce, St. 21, 22. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARB 261 

What win I, if I gain the thing I seek ? 

A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy. 

Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week, 

Or sells eternity to get a toy ? 

For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy ? 

Or whpt fond beggar, but to touch the crown, 

Would with the sceptre straight be stricken down? Lucrece, St. 31. 



WOMAN ( See Marriage) 

She hath all courtly parts, more exquisite 
Than lady, ladies, woman: from even.- one 
The best she hath, and she, of all compounded, 
Outsells them all. Cymb. 3: 5. 

. . . Women are frail too. 
Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves ; 
Which are as easy broke as they make forms. 
Women ! — Help, heaven ! men their creation mar 
In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail ; 
For we are soft as our complexions are 
And credulous to false prints. Meas. for Meas. 2: 4. 

She never told her love, 
But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud, 
Feed on her damask cheek : she pin"d in thought, 
She sat like patience on a monument 
Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed ? 
We men may say more, swear more : but indeed 
Our shows are more than will ; for still we prove 
Much in our vows, but little in our love. Tu'elfth Sight 2: 4. 

.... Let me speak myself, 
Since virtue finds no friends — a wife, a true one? 
A woman, (I dare say without vain-glory.) 
Never yet branded with suspicion? 
Have I with all my full affections 

Still met the King ? lov'd him next Heaven ? obey'd him ? 
Been, out of fondness, superstitious to him ? . . . . 
Almost forgot my prayers to conta 



262 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

Bring me a constant woman to her husband, 

One that ne'er dream 'd a joy beyond his pleasure ; 

And to that woman, when she has done most, 

Yet will I add an honor, — a great patience. Hen. VIII. 3: 1. 



WORLD, THE 

wicked, wicked world ! Merry Wives 2: 1. 

O, how full of briars is this working-day world ! As You Like It 1: 3. 

. . . The world's grown honest ! 
Then is dooms-day near. Ham. 2: 2. 

. . . those mysteries, which heaven 
Will not have earth to know. Corio. 4: 2. 

The world has grown so bad 
That wrens make prey where eagles dare not perch. Rich. HI. 1 : 3. 

World, world, O world ! 
But that thy strange mutations make us hate thee, 
Life would not yield to age. King Lear 4: I. 

1 am in this earthly world ; where, to do harm, 
Is often laudable ! to do good, sometime 
Accounted dangerous folly. Macb. 4: 2. 

Why this — 
Is the world's soul; and just of the same piece 
Is every flatterer's part. Timon 3: 2. 

.... The world is but a word ; 
Were it all yours, to give it in a breath, 
How quickly were it gone? Timon 2: 2. 

You have too much respect upon the world 

They lose it that do buy it with much care. 

... I hold the world but as the world 

A stage, where every man plays a part. Mer. of Ven. 1: 7. 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 263 

This wide and universal theatre 
Presents more woful pageants, than the scene 
Wherein we play in. All the world's a stage, 
And all the men and women merely players: 
They have their exits and their entrances, 
And one man in his time plays many parts, 
His acts being seven ages. As You Like It 2: f. 

O, what a world is this, when what is comely 
Envenoms him that bears it ! . . . . 

O, good old man ! how well in thee appears 
The constant favor of the antique world, 
When service sweat for duty, not for meed ! 
Thou art not for the fashion of these times, 
Where none will sweat but for promotion, 
And having that, do choke their service up 
Even with the having. As You Like It 2: 3. 

I have been studying how I may compare 
This prison, where I live, unto the world : 
And for because the world is populous, 
And here is not a creature but myself, 
I cannot do it : yet I'll hammer 't out. 
My brain I'll prove the female to my soul ; 
My soul, the father : and these two beget 
A generation of still-breeding thoughts, 
And these same thoughts people this little world ; 
In humors like the people of this world, 
For no thought is contented. The better sort, 
As thoughts of things divine, are intermix'd 
With scruples, and do set the word itself 
Against the word ; 

As thus, — "Come, little ones ;" and then again, — 
"It is as hard to come, as for a camel 
To thread the postern of a needle's eye." Rich. II. 5: 5. 

A man may see how this world goes with no eyes. Look with thine 
ears. King Lear 4: 6. 



264 SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 

WORLDLY HONORS AND GLORY (See Life) 

Glory grows guilty of detested crimes 

When, for fame's sake, for praise, an outward part, 

We bend to that the working of the heart. Love's Labor 4: 1. 

O, the fierce wretchedness that glory brings us ! 
Who would not wish to be from wealth exempt, 
Since riches point to misery and contempt ? 
Who would be so mock'd with glory ? or to live 
But in a dream of friendship ? Timon 4: 2. 

By him that rais'd me to this careful height. . . . 

I had rather be a country servant — maid 

Than a great queen, with this condition 

To be so baited, scorn'd, and stormed at 

Small joy have I in being England's queen. Rich. III. 1: 3. 

Lo, now my glory smear'd in dust and blood ! 

My parks, my walks, my manors that I had, 

Even now forsake me ; and, of all my lands, 

Is nothing left me, but my body's length. 

Why, what is pomp, rule, reign, but earth and dust? 

And, live we how we can, yet die we must 

Warwick bids you all farewell, to meet in heaven. Ill Hen. VI. 5: 2. 

Why doth the crown lie there, upon his pillow, 
Being so troublesome a bedfellow ? 
O polish'd perturbation ! goWen care ! 
That keep'st the ports of slumber open wide 
To many a watchful night, sleep with it now ! 
Yet not so sound, and half so deeply sweet, 
As he, whose brow with homely biggin bound, 
Snores out the watch of night. O majesty ! 
When thou dost pinch thy bearer, thou dost sit 
Like a rich armor worn in heat of day, 

That scalds with safety 

. . . There is your crown ; 
And He that wears the crown immortally, 
Long guard it yours I If it affect it more, 



SCRIPTURE THEMES IN SHAKSPEARE 265 

Than as your honor, and as your renown, 

Let me no more from this obedience rise, 

(Which my most true and inward duteous spirit 

Teacheth,) — this prostrate and exterior bending. 

Heaven witness with me, when I here came in, 

And found no course of breath within your majesty, 

How cold it struck my heart ! if I do feign, 

O ! let me in my present wildness die, 

And never live to show th' incredulous world 

The noble change that I have purposed. 

Coming to look on you, thinking you dead, . . . 

I spake unto the crown, as having sense, 

And thus upbraided it : "The care on thee depending, 

Hath fed upon the body of my father ; 

Therefore, thou, best of gold, art worst of gold. 

Other, less fine in carat, is more precious, 

Preserving life in medicine potable: 

But thou, most fine, most honor'd, most renown'd, 

Hast eat thy bearer up." . . . 

God knows, my son, 

By what by-paths, and indirect crook'd ways, 

I met this crown ; and I myself know well 

How troublesome it sat upon my head. 77 Hen. IV. 4: 4. 



BOOK FIFTH 

Shakspeare and Temperance 



267 



SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 

If, as has been said, " Shakspeare was no reformer," it is true only 
of the man. The Genius Shakspeare was not only true to the spirit 
of reform, but was, in advance, a prophecy of events not dreamed of by 
the practical world, until generations after him. Shakspeare's genius, 
like all genius, was not bounded by the narrow, and sometimes soiled, 
limits of its messenger. 

Burns, for example, was truer to the truth as a poet than as a man. 
His noblest poems are as the voice of a prophet proclaiming against 
hypocrisy, cant, and vice ; or as the angel song of purity and love and 
are immeasurably loftier and truer than the man. If we would see the 
spirit of his poetic genius we will visit with him, the "Cotter's Saturday 
Night," rather than with the man who spent more than his leisure hours 
in the beer-house. 

Genius anticipates reform ; long before old prejudices are swept away 
and great evils are openly attacked it foretells the coming event and 
foreshadows the issue of the contest. Enthusiasm incarnated, fulfills the 
prophecy. Some day when, perhaps, the voice of the Seer has long been 
silent and is almost forgotten, the Reformer appears, and in him is the 
incarnation of the great past foretelling. 

In Shakspeare's day there was no thought of a social uprising, based 
upon the practice of abstinence from the use of intoxicating liquors as 
beverages. Yet the genius of the dramatist was contemporary, in 
advance, with Lyman Beecher, Frederic R. Lees, and John B. Gough, 
two hundred years before those temperance apostles were born. Not 
even modern temperance literature, or the most impassioned speech of 
the present-day orator, has ever spoken in terms of more uncompro- 
mising condemnation of strong drink, and nowhere can be found finer 
testimony of the advantages of temperance than is given in some of the 
plays of Shakspeare. 

Of course in these great works which present all the passions and 
emotions of the human race, as upon the stage, there are to be found 
words in praise of wine, and even of debauchery and gross vice ; but 
such praise is from the mouths of men whose words condemn the thing 
they praise. 

FalstafT, for example, is a representative of that class of men who 

269 



270 SHAKSPEARB AND TEMPERANCE 

glory in the revels of feasting, drinking, and debauchery, — who seem to 
be merry only in the gratification of their sensuous nature. In one of his 
drunken, rollicking moods, this man sounds the praise of liquor in the 
peculiar style of that age which Shakspeare has so faithfully por- 
trayed : — 

" A good sherris-sack hath a two-fold operation in it. It ascends me into the 
brain; dries me there all the foolish, and dull, and crudy vapors which environ it : 
makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes ; 
which deliver'd o'er to the voice, (the tongue,) which is the birth, becomes excel- 
lent wit. The second property of your excellent sherris is the warming of the 
blood; which, before cold and settled, left the liver white and pale, which is the 
badge of pusillanimity and cowardice; but the sherris warms it, and makes it 
course from the inwards to the parts extreme. It illuminateth the face, which, as 
a beacon, gives warning to all the rest of this little kingdom, man, to arm; and 
then the vital commoners, and inland petty spirits, muster me all to their captain, 
the heart, who, great and puff'd up with this retinue, doth any deed of courage; 
and this valor comes of sherris. So that skill in the weapon is nothing without 
sack; for that sets it a-work; and learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil, 
till sack commences it in act and use. ... If I had a thousand sons, the first prin- 
ciple I would teach them should be, — to forswear thin potations, and addict them- 
selves to sack." 77 Henry IV. 4: 3. 

No one having any regard for his reputation, would venture to quote, 
with approval, a doctrine that would make it a "first principle" of life 
to teach our sons how to get drunk. 

But to those who will study Shakspeare's full-length portrait of this 
singular specimen of humorous dishonor and corruption there is no 
need of warning. Consistent with the Falstaff character is the follow- 
ing absurd tirade on the subject of "honor:" — 

Can honor set to a leg ? No. Or an arm ? No. Or take away the grief of a 
wound? No. Honor hath no skill in surgery then? No. What is honor? A 
word. What is that word, honor? Air. A trim reckoning! — Who hath it? He 
that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. Is it 
insensible then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? No. 
Why? Detraction will not suffer it: — therefore, I'll none of it: Honor is a 
mere scutcheon, and so ends my catechism. I Henry IV. 5: 1. 

"Fools make a mock at sin" but with the end comes judgment. King 
Henry IV. answers Falstaff 's over-friendly salute thus : — 

" I know thee not, old man : Fall to thy prayers J 
How ill white hairs become a fool and jester! 
I have long dream'd of such a kind of man. 
So surfeit-swelled, so old, and so profane ; 



SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 271 

But being awake, I do despise my dream. 

Make less thy body, hence, and more thy grace ; 

Leave gormandizing; know, the grave doth gape 

For thee thrice wider than for other men. // Hen. IV. 3: 5. 

Human language has never been framed in a more forceful indictment 
of strong drink as a factor of the greatest crimes than is found in the 
plays of Macbeth and Othello. 

When the magnitude of his contemplated crime produces in Macbeth 
a fear of failure, the use of drink as a potent agent is thus suggested 
by his guilty partner, Lady Macbeth : — 

" When Duncan is asleep, . . his two chamberlains 
Will I with wine and wassail so convince, 1 
That memory, the warder of the brain, 
Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason 
A limbeck * only : When in swinish sleep 
Their drenched natures lie, as in a death, 
What cannot you and I perform upon 
The unguarded Duncan ? what not put upon 
His spongy officers ; who shall bear the guilt 
Of our great quell." 3 Macb. 1: 7. 

Similar is the thought of the villain Iago in the play of Othello, as he 
exclaims : — 

" If I can but fasten one cup upon him 
With that which he hath drunk to-night already 
He'll be as full of quarrel and offense 
As my young mistress's dog." Othello 2: 3. 

Following up his scheme of ruin, Iago leads the night-revel and suc- 
ceeds in producing in Cassio, a condition of drunkenness which puts him 
into a quarrelsome mood. Othello is disturbed by the midnight riot and, 
angry with Cassio (the seeming cause of it) he dismisses him from his 
office. Then follows a conversation in which Iago hypocritically pro- 
fesses sympathetic interest in Cassio's welfare, while Cassio himself con- 
demns his own intoxicated condition in the bitterest terms :— 

"Iago. What, are you hurt lieutenant? 
Cas. Ay, past all surgery. 
Iago. Marry, Heaven forbid ! 

Cas. Reputation, reputation, reputation ! O, I have lost my reputation ! I have 
lost the immortal part of myself and what remains is bestial. . . . Drunk? and 

1 Overpower. 2 Alembic, — a glass used for distilling. s Murder. 



272 SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 

speak parrot? and squabble? swagger? swear? and discourse fustian with one's 
own shadow ? — O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no other name to be 

known by, let us call thee devil ! 

I remember a mass of things but nothing distinctly; a quarrel, but nothing 
wherefore. — O that men should put an enemy into their brains! that we should 
with joy, pleasance, revel, and applause, transform ourselves into beasts!" 

To which, Iago in the pretense of sincere friendship, urging Cassio to 
appeal to Othello for restoration to his lost position in the army, says : — 

" I could heartily wish this had not befallen ; but since it is as it is, mend it for 
your good." 

And Cassio replies : — 

"I shall ask him for my place again ; he shall tell me I am a drunkard ! Had 
I as many mouths as Hydra such an answer would stop them all. To be a sensible 
man, by and by a fool, and presently a beast ! O strange ! every inordinate cup is 
unblessed and the ingredient is a devil." Othello 2: 3. 

In the play of Macbeth several references are made to the ruinous 
effects of intemperance. Macduff, referring not to the intemperance of 
drinking only, but to the lack of self-restraint, says : — 

"Boundless intemperance 
In nature is a tyranny ; it hath been 
Th' untimely emptying of the happy throne, 
And fall of many kings." Macb. 4: 3. 

Lady Macbeth's thought that with "wine and wassail" she could so 
overpower the sleeping guards of Duncan : "that memory the warder of 
the brain shall be a fume and the receipt of reason a limbeck only" is 
indorsed by the hunting lord in the induction to the Taming of the 
Shrew. Finding a drunken tailor sleeping in the street, he asks: — 

" What's here? one dead, or drunk? see he breathe?" 

And the answer is : — 

" He breathes : were he not warm'd with ale 
This were a bed but cold to sleep so soundly." 

The lord looks at the gross and stupid body and exclaims : — 

" O monstrous beast ! how like a swine he lies ! 

Grim death, how foul and loathsome is thine image ! " 



SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 273 

And then he determines to play upon the intoxicated brain of the sot 
and make him believe, when he awakens, that he is not Sly, the drunken 
tailor, but a rich lord, possessing in abundance, all he can desire, having 
many servants to wait his orders and obey his commands. 

Hardly less humorous is the attempt of Cassio to persuade himself 
that he is not drunk. How it calls to mind the ludicrous attempt which 
men, sometimes, make to walk straight when under the influence of 
drink : — 

" Do not think, gentlemen, I am drunk : this is my ancient ; — this is my right 
hand, and this is my left hand. — I am not drunk now; I can stand well enough 
and speak well enough." Othello 2: 3. 

The corrupting and enslaving nature of strong drink is illustrated in 
The Tempest, where the poor half-savage Caliban, who has been a kind 
of savage King of an island, is reduced, by drink, to the most abject 
slavery and in this condition he avows himself the slave of the man who 
supplies him with liquor. He says : — 

"'I'll swear upon that bottle to be thy true subject, for the liquor is not 
earthly." 

" I'll shew thee every fertile inch o' the island ; and I will kiss thy foot ; I 
prithee, be my god." 

" I'll shew thee the best springs ; I'll pluck thee berries ; I'll fish for thee and 
get thee wood." The Tempest 2: 2. 

And when, too late, the poor wretch discovers how he has been fooled, 
— he cries : — 

" What a thrice double ass 
Was I to take this drunkard for a god 
And worship this dull fool." The Tempest 5: /. 

The dehumanizing effects of strong drink are fearfully portrayed in 
the person of the convict Barnadine, in Measure for Measure : — 

" A man that apprehends death no more dreadfully but as a drunken sleep ; 
careless, reckless, and fearless of what's past, present or to come, insensible of 
mortality, and desperately mortal." 

Barnadine is past all hope of man according to the Provost of the 
jail. He is so brutalized by liquor that he has been indifferent, even to 
the execution of the death penalty : — 
18 



274 SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 

"He hath evermore had the liberty of the prison: give him leave to escape 
hence, he would not : drunk many times a day, if not many days entirely drunk. 
We have very oft awak'd him, as if to carry him to execution, and show'd him a 
seeming warrant for it : it hath not moved him at all. Meas. for Meas. 4: 2. 

Yet there is some soul left, even in one so deeply damned as Barna- 
dine, for when the Friar-Duke comes to bid him prepare for execution 
he says: — 

" 'Friar, not I : I have been drinking hard all night, and I will have more 
time to prepare me, or they shall beat out my brains with billets : I will not con- 
sent to die this day, that's certain." 

And the Friar says: — 

" A creature unprepar'd, unmeet for death ; 
And, to transport him in the mind he is 
Were damnable." Meas. for Meas. 4: 3. 

In the Merchant of Venice, Portia (one of Shakspeare's sweetest 
and brightest of women) expresses contempt for the man who drinks, 
and at the same time shows that a man addicted to drinking will face 
the devil and hell to get liquor. The scene is laid in a room in Portia's 
house, where she converses with her maid, Nerissa, upon the respective 
qualities of various suitors for her hand and fortune : — 

" Ner. How like you the young German, the duke of Saxony's nephew ? 

Por. Very vilely in the morning when he is sober; and most vilely in the 
afternoon, when he is drunk. When he is best he is a little worse than a man ; 
and when he is worst he is little better than a beast. 

Ner. If he should offer to choose and choose the right casket, you should 
refuse to perform your father's will, if you should refuse to accept him. 

Por. Therefore, for fear of the worst, I pray thee, set a deep glass of Rhenish 
wine on the contrary casket; for if the devil be within, and the temptation with- 
out I know he will choose it." Mer. of Ven. 1: 2. 

The banquet scene on Pompey's galley, in Antony and Cleopatra 
is a bacchanalian orgy. An attendant in carrying off Lepidus is said to 
bear "a third part of the world." "The third part then is drunk," says 
one. 

The French had a conceit that they were more vivacious and lively 
than the English and that this difference ought to give them an advan- 
tage in battle. They attributed this difference, in part, to the use, by 



SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 275 

the English, of beer in contrast with the wines which they used. The 
Constable of France says : — 

" Dieu de battailes! Where have they this mettle? 
Is not their climate foggy, raw and dull 
On whom as in despite the sun looks pale 
Killing their fruit with frowns? Can sodden water 
A drench for sur-rein'd jades, their barley broth, 
Decoct their cold blood to such valiant heat? 
And shall our quick blood, spirited with wine, 
Seem frosty?" Hen. V. 3: 5. 

The worse than beastliness of drunkenness is thus referred to : — 

" Drunken desire must vomit his receipt 
Ere he can see his own abomination." Lucrece, St. 97. 

A boy, servant to Nym, one of the rowdy followers of Falstaff, 
describes his master thus : — 

"... his few bad words are match'd with his few bad deeds ; for 'a never 
broke a man's head but his own, and that was against a post, when he was 
drunk. Hen. V. 3 : 2. 

In Merry Wives of Windsor a contemptible faction, with Falstaff as 
their leader, is referred to, and this same Nym is one of the party : — 

" Marry sir, I have matters in my head against you ; and against your cony- 
catching rascals, Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol. They carried me to the tavern 
and made me drunk, and afterward picked my pocket . . . though I cannot 
remember what I did when you made me drunk, yet I am not altogether an ass. 
. . . I'll ne'er be drunk whilst I live again, but in honest, civil, godly company, for 
this trick : if I be drunk, I'll be drunk with those that fear God, and not with 
drunken knaves." Merry Wives 1: 1. 

An odd conceit surely, that one may be drunk, without harm, if only 
in the company of the "godly," — those who "fear God," but it illustrates 
a current thought of those times and one not yet entirely obsolete. 

It is Nym also who, contemptuously, says of one of the drinking 
crew : — 

"He was gotten in drink." Merry Wives 1:3. 

In answer to the question — "What's a drunken man like?" a clown 
answers : — 



276 SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 

" Like a drowned man, a fool and a madman : one draught above heat makes 
him a fool: the second mads him; and a third drowns him." Twelfth Night i: 5. 

And in Romeo and Juliet we have this description : — 

"Thou are like one of those fellows that, when he enters the confines of a 
tavern, claps me his sword upon the table, and says, 'God send me no need of 
thee!' and by the operation of the second cup, draws him on the drawer, when, 
indeed, there is no need." 

The ill effects of wine and strong drink are variously described, or 
alluded to, in the following passages : — 

"I'll heat his blood with Rhenish wine to-night." Troi. and Cres. 5:1. 

" Thou are going to Lord Timon's feast ... to see meat fill knaves and 
wine heat fools." Timon 1: 1. 
"Now in madness 
Being full of supper and distempering draughts 
Upon malicious knavery, dost thou come, 
To start my quiet." Othello 1: 1. 

It seems that the idea prevailed in Shakspeare's day, as it does yet, 
that clemency should be extended toward one who commits a crime 
when drunk, for in King Henry V. we have this : — 

" Enlarge the man committed yesterday 
That rail'd against our person : we consider 
It was excess of wine that set him on ; 
And, on his more advice, we pardon him. Hen. V. 2: 2. 

We have seen, in Measure for Measure, how that the culprit was 
permitted to continue in a sottish condition, even when in the con- 
demned cell, and how his drunkenness was made a plea for putting off 
his execution. Timon of Athens alludes to the same thought in his 
harangue against thieves: — 

"Rascal thieves 
Here's gold. Go suck the subtle blood o' the grape 
Till the high fever seeth your blood to froth 
And so 'scape hanging." Timon 4: 3. 

The custom of social drinking and of drinking in hospitality, is thus 
referred to : — 

" I have very poor and unhappy brains for drinking : I could well wish courtesy 
would invent some other custom of entertainment.". . . "I have drunk but one 



SHAKSPEARE AND TEMPERANCE 277 

cup to-night, and that was craftily qualified too, — and behold what innovation it 
makes here : I am unfortunate in the infirmity and dare not task my weakness 
any more." Othello 2: 3. 

" To my mind, though I am native here 
And to the manner born, it is a custom 
More honor'd in the breach than the observance. 
This heavy-head revel, east and west, 
Makes us traduced and tax'd of other nations : 
They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase 
Soil our addition." Ham. 1:4. 

The splendid advantages of a temperate life to health and morals is 
nobly set forth in the language of good old Adam in As You Like; It. 
The old hero says : — 

" Though I look old yet I am strong and lusty, 
For in my youth I never did apply 
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood : 
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo 
The means of weakness and debility; 
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter 
Frosty but kindly." As You Like It 2: 3. 

This reminds us forcibly of Milton: — 

" O, madness to think use of strongest wines 
And strongest drinks our chief support of health, 
When God, with these forbidden, made choice to rear 
His mighty champion strong above compare, 
Whose drink was only from the liquid brook." Samson Agonistes. 

Shakspeare further testifies of the virtues of temperance : — 

" Ask God for temperance ; that's the appliance only 
Which your disease requires." Hen. VIII. 1: 1. 

The following words, addressed by Hamlet to his mother, refer to 
another evil than that of drinking, but are equally applicable to the 
virtue and power of abstinence of strong drink : — 

"... refrain 
And that shall lend a kind of easiness 
To the next abstinence: the next more easy; 
For use almost can change the stamp of nature ; 
And master the devil, or throw him out 
With wondrous potency/' Hamlet 3: 4. 



278 SHAKSPEARB AND TEMPERANCE 

This also is a tribute to the value of temperance : — 

" For aught I see, they are as sick that surfeit with too much, as they that 
starve with nothing : it is no small happiness, therefore, to be seated in the mean : 
superfluity comes sooner by white hairs, but competency lives longer." 

Mer. of Ven. i: 2. 

To the praise of water as a beverage we have this passage which 
makes an admirable sentiment or "toast" at a feast : — 

" Here's that, which is too weak to be a sinner, 
Honest water which ne'er left man i' the mire." Tim. of Athens 1: 2. 

Thus, Shakspeare witnessed against the use of strong drink on all 
the grounds of experience, physiology, and morals, and recognized with 
high approval the practice of abstinence, long before any organized 
society for that purpose was in existence. 

The poet Cowper went still further. He saw the evil not only in the 
use and customs of society, but also in the chief corner-stone of the 
whole devil's structure of the drinking system, — the licensed saloon — 
and he satirized the iniquitous system thus : — 

" The excise is fattened with the rich result 
Of all this riot. The ten thousand casks, 
For ever dribbling out their base contents, 
Touched by the Midas finger of the State, 
Bleed gold, for Parliament to vote away. 
Gloriously drunk — obey the important call; 
Her cause demands the assistance of your throats; 
Ye all can swallow, and she asks no more." 



GENERAL INDEX 



The subjects given in capitals and small capitals refer to Scripture Themes in 
Book IV. 



Author's Explanation, 117. 
Ambition, 119. 
Atonement, 213. 
Attributes of God, 148. 

A greater than genius, 11; than Solo- 
mon, 12. 

Aaron the Moor — an infidel, 94. 

Abbott, Lyman, retribution in Shak- 
speare, 81. 

Abel, 51 ; murder of, 87; blood of cries 
out, 171. 

Abraham quoted by Shylock, 62 ; bosom 
of, 59- 

Abstinence, virtue of, 277. 

Adam, his sons my brothers, transgres- 
sion of, 191; penalty of, 196; digged, 
220; the offending, 225. 

Adam in As You Like It, advantages 
of temperance, 272, 277. 

Adversity, uses of, 241. 

Affliction, 243. 

Age, old, 176, 211. 

Ahab, comparison with Macbeth, 87, 98 ; 
covetousness of, death of, 88. 

Alexander, dust of, 185. 

All's well that ends well, — scripture 
quoted, 56. 

All-seer, that high, 168. 

All-souls day, 168. 

Amen, could not say it, 109. 

Ambition, sin of fallen angels, 119; 
dreams of, 120. 

Angel, man like an, 185. 

Angels, fall of, 165. 

Angelo, 10; as a judge, a criminal, 71; 
hypocrisy of, 163. 

279 



Angelus, the, 77. 

Antonio, 63 ; his hatred of the Jew, 67 ; 

weakness of, 68; saved by Portia, 74; 

his life not sacrificed, 100. 
Antony, Cleopatra and, 94. 
Apostle, prophets and, 219. 
Arbitrator, time the common, 175. 
Archbishop, peace and the, 51, 202. 
Ariel in Isaiah and The Tempest, 55. 
Arthur, bosom of, 59. 
Ascension day, 123. 
Assumptions of Jesus, 12. 
Atonement, 70, 213. 
Authority, men's brief, 71, 168. 
Ave Marias, 219. 

Beliefs, 218. 
Betrayal, 249. 

Bacchanalian feast, 274. 

Bachelor, married man and, 191. 

Bacon, reference to, 6. 

Banished, a word the damned use in 
hell, 157. 

Battle, few die well who die in, 256. 

Beaufort, immortality and, 112, 137; 
his death-bed scene, 221. 

Beauty, effect of time upon, 179. 

Beecher, 269. 

Beer, English, compared with French 
wine, 275. 

Bell, its call to worship, 217. 

Best, betrayed the, 249. 

Bible, the one book of England, VIII ; 
necessary to Shakspeare, XIII ; doc- 
trines of, 3; words interpreted, 27; 
King James translation of, IX, 27; 



280 



INDEX 



the highest inspiration to Poet, 27; 
characters of 23, 62; striking pic- 
tures from, 52; histories of, stained 
by sins of heroes, 79; versatile em- 
ployment of, 51-66. 

Birds climbing high, 120. 

Bishop, religion of a, 161. 

Blind man, miracle of healing, 54. 

Blood, of Abel cries out, 23, 51, 171 ', 
will have blood, 236. 

Book of life, 154; name blotted from, 

251. 
Book of Numbers, 52. 
Books in brooks, 196. 
Bribery, 198. 
Brother, better to die than sister's 

shame, 72. 
Brutus, wife's view of marriage, 84. 
Buckingham, address of, 141 ; forgiving 

spirit of, 146. 
Bunyan, IX. 

Burial, a Christian, 219. 
Burns, his need of a saviour, 15; true 

to the truth, 269. 

Charity — Generosity — Hospitality, 

121. 
Chastity, 253. 
Christ, 166. 

Christian Ministry, 122. 
Clergymen, 122. 
Comfort, 124. 
Conscience, 125. 
Constancy, 140. 
Contentment, 191. 
Corruption, Official, 198. 
Courage, 209. 
Curses, 226. 

Caesar, death of, 13 ; turned to clay, 

185; shall he lie, 210. 
Cain, 51, 62, 87; go wander with, 227; 

the spirit of, 256. 
Caliban enslaved by drink, 273. 
Calumny, no greatness escapes ; against 

virtue swears, 240, 241. 
Calvinism in Othello, 57. 
Camel, needle's eye and, 52. 
Candle-light, 180. 
Canonized as a saint, 228. 



Cardinal, death scene of, 221. 

Carlyle quoted, XIV; on the Poet's 
breadth of moral thought, 80. 

Cassio, drunk, 57 ; victim of Iago's plot, 
102; denounces wine as a devil, 272. 

Chalmers' life of Shakspeare quoted, 5. 

Character, greater than genius, Emer- 
son on, 11 ; personality of, 12; knows 
no self, 14. 

Chaste, Isabella, 254; Desdemona and 
Lucrece, 76. 

Chastity the jewel of our house, 254. 

Chatterton, his tragic end, 15. 

Child, a thankless, 152. 

Children, sins of fathers and, 60, 235. 

Children's children in cause of peace, 
202. 

Christ in the sonnets, XI; wrote noth- 
ing* !3; assumptions of, 12, 15; 
world's need of, 14; spirit of ad- 
vancing, 16; references to, 23; com- 
manding the devil, 58; Judas's, all 
hail to, 160, 250; sepulchre of, cross 
of, 166; blood of, 215; mother of, 
219. 

Christian, ministry of, 123 ; ensign of 
cross of, 166; burial, 219. 

Christianity and the drama, 3, 103. 

Choir sings Te Deum, 217. 

Church, marriage and the, 187-189; 
bell of, 127 ; inside of a, 226. 

Churchman, meekness becomes a, 191 ; 
prayer of, 218. 

Clarke's concordance quoted, 19. 

Clarence, Duke of, his dream of the 
after-life, ill. 

Clergy, 122; responsibility and duty of, 
123. 

Clergyman, false and deceitful, a, 143. 

Clemency to criminals in drink, 276. 

Cleopatra, 69. 

Coleridge, 64, 75, 83, 94, 98. 

Columbus, Shakspeare the literary, 7. 

Comfort, other than this world, 163. 

Consistency of pastors, 122. 

Conscience, 81, 90; cowards and, 123, 
127; born of love, 125; a dangerous 
thing, 130; pangs of in death, 137; 
Macbeth, a study of, 129; thousand 
tongues of, 223. 



INDEX 



281 



Constancy, lack of fills men with 

faults, 141. 
Constantine, mother of, 219. 
Contrite tears, 226. 
Cordelia, heroism of, 74. 
Coriolanus, 94. 

Cotter's Saturday night, 15, 269. 
Cowards, conscience makes us, 123, 

126. 
Cowper on revenue from drink, 278. 
Cromwell, 13, 171. 
Cross of Christ, 166. 
Crown, heavy to bear, 192, 264. 
Curse of ignorance, 164. 
Custom of drinking condemned by 

Hamlet, 277. 
Cymbeline, 94. 

Darkness, 180. 

Death and the Future, 131. 

Death — Preparation for, 138. 

Deceit, 142. 

Deceitfulness of Sin, 237. 

Devil, 230. 

Dying — Testimony of the, 249. 

Damnation, 167. 

Daniel, 13. 

Dante, 103. 

Darkness, of ignorance, 164; prince of, 
230. 

David, Goliath and, 63. 

Death, the future and, 131, 137; no de- 
ceit in, 133; horror of, 135; Hamlet's 
soliloquy on, 135; levels all men, 
134; life the fool of, 179. 

Deborah, 93; Joan of Arc and, 53; 
sword of, 219. 

Desdemona, Mrs. Jameson on, 74; hus- 
band first in honor, 76; death of, 

r 222. 

Devil, argument of, 73 ; is comic in the 
old plays, 95; his policy, 144; gar- 
ment of, 158, 231 ; crest and horn of, 
162; the eternal, shame the, 230. 

Dickens, Charles, 7, 9; on Hen. VIII, 
85. 

Disraeli quoted, 3. 

Dives in hell, 158. 



Divine Being, terms of used by Shak- 

speare, 20. 
Divine, perception of the, 165. 
Divinity shapes our ends, a king 

edged by, 208. 
Dogberry still lives, 9. 
Dorcas, 93. 
Drama fails to express Christianity, 

103. 
Dreams, stuff they are made of, 134. 
Drunk, with those who fear God, 275. 
Drunken tailor in Taming of the 

Shrew, 272. 
Dryden, 5. 

Effects of Sin, 236. 
Eternity, 131. 

Eaton, IX; on Judas and Jezebel, 92. 

Edward, King, his hope of heaven, III. 

Egyptians in a fog, 164. 

Elijah, 13. 

Ellis on Christ in Shakspeare, XI, 64. 

Emerson, 7, 11, on a divine person, 12. 

Ency. Brit, quoted, 7, 8, 27, 93. 

England a country of the Bible, VIII. 

Erasmus, England and the Bible, VIII. 

Error, texts quoted to support, 144. 

Eternal, life, 134; wrath of the, 224. 

Eternity, 112, 113, 131, 174, 261. 

Eve, 247 ; legacy of, 233 ; apple of, 237. 

Everlasting fire, 156. 

Evil, self-destruction of, 95; preachers 

to us, 139. 
Excommunication, 228. 
Explanation of Scripture Themes, 117. 

Faithfulness, Friendship, Constan- 
cy, 140. 
Falsehood, Flattery, Deceit, 142. 
Forgiveness, Pardon, 145. 
Friendship, 140. 
Future, the, 131. 

Faith, no tricks in, 141, 162; trust not 

him who breaks it, 249. 
Fall of man, 236. 
False witness, 236. 



282 



INDEX 



Falstaff, 9; Taine on, 79; bad end of, 
82; death of, 137; advise sons to 
drink, 270. 

Father, sin of, on children, 6o, 235; 
killed by son in battle, 259; consult 
in marriage, 188. 

Father of Our Lord, 166. 

Festive drinking condemned, 276. 

Filial ingratitude, 152. 

Fires in hell, 157, 159- 

Flattery, sin of, 142. 

Force of fate, Ruskin on, 91. 

Forgiveness, 145; not if offence con- 
tinues, 146. 

Friends, 140-142. 

Generosity, 121. 

God's Attributes, 148. 

God Our Defence and Help, 149. 

God Our Trust — Not Man, 150. 

Glory — Worldly, 264. 

Gold, Money, 150. 

Grace Before Meat, 152. 

Gratitude, Ingratitude, 152. 

Grief, 241. 

Garibaldi, 14. 

Galileo, 9. 

Genius, universality of Shakspeare's, 7, 
8; Emerson on, 7; Ruskin, 9; not a 
creator, 9; not iconoclastic, 10; not 
so great as character, 1 1 ; cannot 
give peace, 11; impersonal, 12; 
wealth of, 16; reform and, not 
bounded by its messenger, 269. 

Ghost in Hamlet suggests the after- 
life, 107. 

Gladstone, 14. 

Globe, dissolution of the, 134. 

Glory, wretchedness follows, 264. 

Goethe, 103. 

God in Shakspeare, V. 19; why denied 
or ignored, 19; numerous illustra- 
tions of, 20, 21. 

God, attributes of, 148; forgiveness of, 
145 ; supremacy of, 149 ; no wings 
to fly from, 168, 186; his angels, 
199; maker of marriages, 199; re- 
ligious oaths and, 214; avenges 



wrong openly, 171, 172; justice and 

judgment of, 148, 169, 202. 
Gold, 151, 173, 192, 265. 
Golgotha, 54. 
Goliath, David and, 63. 
Goodness, 253, 256. 
Gough, 9, 269. 

Grace before meat, a soldier's, 118. 
Grant, General, 14. 
Green's history quoted, VIII. 
Guilt, 123. 

Hate, 226. 

Heaven, 154. 

Heaven, Recognition in, 155. 

Hell, 226. 

Hoarded Wealth, 260. 

Honor, 209. 

Honors — Worldly, 264. 

Hope, 199. 

Hospitality, 121. 

Humility, 191. 

Hypocrisy, Insincerity, 160. 

Hagar in Merchant of Venice, 60. 

Hamlet, a sphinx, 64; compared with 
Job, 66; use of scripture in, 52; his 
death involved in the tragedy, 96; 
immortality and, 104-9, !35 ', n0 
doubt of future state, 107 ; not a 
sceptic, 108; address to his mother, 
183. 

Hand, no soul in a marble, 11. 

Handel, 7. 

Harvey, 9. 

Heaven, word frequently substituted 
for "God," 19; cannot be dramatized, 
103; recognition in, 155; a summons 
to, 131 ; everlasting gates of, 203. 

Helena, quotes scripture, 56; her 
patient love, 75. 

Hell, stage cannot represent it, 103 ; 
black as, torture of, fire of, damned 
banished in, everburning, 154-9; min- 
ister of, 227. 

Henry VIII, why play does not bring 
sin to judgment, 85. 

Herod and the wise men, death of, 59. 

Herodias and Lady Macbeth, 93. 



INDEX 



283 



Heroes and heroines, 67-8; Mrs. 
Jameson on, 69; Ruskin on, 68, 75. 

Hillis, 8. 

Historical plays, the, and the script- 
ures, 99. 

History of man in plays, 95. 

Holy writ, 162; proofs of, 232. 

Homer, 103. 

Honest, one in two thousand, 212. 

Hooker, IX. 

Hudson quoted, 58; on the sources of 
the Tempest, 54; improved text by, 
79; note of, on the word Heaven, 
172; on the Lord's prayer, 248. 

Hugo, note by, on Hamlet, 64. 

Hunt, Prof., 8. 

Hundredth Psalm, 183. 

Husband an elm, 187 ; widow cries to 
God as, 169. 

Ignorance, Pride, 164. 

Ill-gotten Wealth, 260. 

Ingratitude, 152. 

Injustice, 169. 

Innocence, 165. 

Insecurity and Effects of Sin, 236. 

Insincerity, 160. 

Iago, 9, 82; skill and cunning of, 101, 
102; treachery and death of, 99; use 
of wine to effect purpose, 271. 

Ice, chaste as, 239. 

Iconoclast, genius no, 10. 

Ideals, fall of our, 73. 

Immortality, stage not adequate to it, 
103; in the play of Hamlet, 104-6; 
Paul quoted, 104; assumed, 104; 
Macbeth's testimony on, 104; Beau- 
fort's death-bed, Lorenzo's solilo- 
quy, 112; Romeo and Juliet, no; 
Shakspeare's personal testimony, 
1 13 - no final word on, 112. 

Imogen her heroic qualities, 75. 

Incarnation of the Christ-spirit, 16. 

Infidel, no decent one in Shakspeare, 
94- 

Inheritance law of, 51. 

Irreverent use of scripture, 57. 

Isabella, the importunate widow and, 
60; a true preacher, 71 ; sacrifice for 



her brother, 72; fall of ideals, 72; 
Schlegel on, 74; mediatorial charac- 
ter of the play, 74-100. 

Jesus, Christ, Saviour, 166. 
Judgment, 167. 
Justice, Injustice, 169. 

Jacob, Shylock's pattern and saint, 62, 

208. 
Jael, parallel of in the Tempest, 56. 
Jameson (Mrs.), quoted, 68, 88. 
Jephthah, sacrifice of daughter, 52. 
Jerusalem, 132. 
Jesus, 22 (see Christ). 
Jezebel, compared with Lady Macbeth, 

89; compared with Judas, Eaton on, 

92. 
Joan of Arc, 53, 256. 
Job compared with Hamlet, 65, 66. 
John the Baptist, 93. 
Johnson, Samuel, on Henry VIII, 85. 
Judas, 51, 62 f 166; kisses of, 142, 161; 

hypocrisy of, 160; worse than, 228; 

a kissing traitor, 250. 
Judge, the supernal, 168; no king can 

corrupt, 170. 
Judges, defeat judgment when they 

steal, 198. 
Judgment, sin and, 83 ; here as well as 

hereafter, 109, 169; word of, 221. 
Judgment-day, 56; trumpet of, 167. 
Juliet, heroism of, 75; an unstained 

wife, 190. 
Just, quarrel of the, thrice armed, 171. 
Justice, of God, 148; gold and, 198; 

uneven in the world, 173 ; salvation 

not in, 205. 

Knowledge, 173. 

Katharine, wifely devotion of, 76. 

Keats, 7. 

Kings, must die, 131, 136; divinity 

hedge a, 208. 
King of Kings, 167, 218. 
King James Bible, translation, lofty 

style of introduction, IX, 27. 
Kingdom, the infernal, revenge from, 

226. 



284 



INDEX 



Kisses, tyrants, 161 (see Judas). 
Knaves, all are, 236, 251. 

Lessons from Nature, 196. 
Light and Darkness, 180. 
Life, Time, 174. 
Love, 181. 
Lust, 182. 

Laban, Shylock and, 62. 

Lady Anne, unnatural yielding to Rich- 
ard, 98. 

Lamartine, 79. 

Lamb, Charles, on Shakspeare and 
Jesus, 13. 

Lapidoth, the dame of, 53. 

Law, the will not subject to, 186. 

Lear, his daughter's sacrifice, 74. 

Lees, 269. 

Lie, shall Caesar? 210. 

Life, a miracle, 174; nobleness of, 176; 
a walking shadow, 174; brevity of, 
175; death's fool, 179; humble, 192; 
every man holds dear, 210; book of, 
name blotted from, 251. 

Light, an enemy of evil, 180. 

Lincoln, Abraham, 13, 14. 

Livingstone, 13. 

Lorenzo and Jessica, 112. 

Love, incarnated, 16; altereth not, 181. 

Lowell on Hamlet, 64. 

Lucifer, 24. 

Lucrece, chastity of, 76. 

Luther, 13. 

Malice, 239. 

Man, 183. 

Man's Responsibility, 180. 

Marriage, 187. 

Meekness, Contentment, Humility, 

191. 
Mercy, 193. 
Miracles, 195. 
Money, 150. 

Mabie, Hamilton W., 5, on Joan of 

Arc, S3- 
Macbeth, play of, compared with Ahab 

and Jezebel, 87-89 ; conscience of, 9S ; 



nemesis, 82; various views of, 91; 
the after-life, 109; a study on con- 
science, 129; soliloquy of, on judg- 
ment here and to come, 169; strong 
drink and crimes, 271. 

Macbeth, Lady, womanliness of, 69 ; re- 
morse, the red stain of blood, 90; 
good in her character, 91 ; conscience 
and remorse, 221. 

Macduff, Malcolm and, 98. 

Mahomet, 219. 

Maid of Orleans, 53, 256. 

Malice, 122, 239. 

Man, state of, like a kingdom, 128; in- 
gratitude of, 153; not passion's slave, 
140; God made him, 183; nobleness 
of, 185; holds life dear, 210; fall of, 
236; true to self, never false to 
others, 253. 

Manuscripts, destroyed by fire, V; of 
Shakspeare unknown, 4. 

Marble hand, 11. 

Marriage, 75, 84, 99, 100, 183-188. 

Mary, Mother of Jesus, 213. 

Mary and Martha, 93. 

Martyrs, self-sacrifice of, 14. 

Master, Jesus as, 166. 

Measure for measure, a mediatorial 
play, 74, 100. 

Mercy, 99, 100, 193, 194, 227. 

Michelet, 19. 

Millet's Angelus, 77. 

Milton IX, 103 ; on wine drinking, 277. 

Mind, 210; torture of the, 221. 

Miracle, Shakspeare's works not a, 51 ; 
reference to, 195, 255. 

Miriam, 93. 

Moffatt, 13. 

Moral action of plays, 78; Carlyle, on, 
80; Moulton on, 80. 

Moral problems of the four grand 
tragedies, 93. 

Moral inculcation of plays, 77. 

Moses, 13. 

Moulton, warning to readers of Shak- 
speare, 77; on the morals of, 81; 
sees good points in Lady Macbeth, 
91. 

Mozart, genius of, 7, 10. 



INDEX 



285 



Murder will speak, 126. 

Music, 217. 

Mystery of Shakspeare, 4. 

Nature's Lessons, 196. 

Naboth, vineyard of, 88, 89. 
Needle's eye, 34, 52, 263. 
Nemesis, 82. 
Nero and Paul, 93. 
Newton, 9. 
Numbers, book of, 52. 

Oaths, 214. 

Obedience, 197. 

Official Corruption, Tyranny, 198. 

Old-age, 176, 211. 
Olive-branch, 202. 
Omnipotence of God, 148. 
Ophelia and immortality, 108. 
Othello, 74, 98, 101, 271. 

Pardon, 145. 
Patience, Hope, 199. 
Peace, 201. 
Penitence, 224. 
Practices, Religious, 218. 
Praise, Thankfulness, 203. 
Prayer, 204. 
Pride, 164. 
Providence, 208. 

Purity, Honor, Courage, Rectitude, 
209. 

Parallel passages, explanation of, 32. 
Pardon, not ransom, 72; corrupted by 

gold, 151. 
Parody of 1 Cor. 2:9, 61. 
Patience, 200; on a monument, 261. 
Pastors, 122, 124. 

Paul, 13, 14, 55, 61, 84, 93, 103, 108. 
Perjury, 172. 
Personality, of Jesus, 13; of all great 

characters, 12, 13. 
Philosopher, cannot endure tooth-ache, 

201. 
Physician, the divine more needed 

than, 221, 224. 



Pilot, 62. 

Pity the virtue of law, 194. 

Pious phrases used by irreligious, 57. 

Pirate, a sanctimonious, 161. 

Plays, not written as literature, 6; re- 
ligion in plots of, 94. 

Poe, 9. 

Poems of Shakspeare, 61, 76. 

Portia, heroic qualities of, 74, 99; her 
contempt for a drunkard, 274; 
Brutus', her view of marriage, 84. 

Pound of flesh, strange contract of, 68. 

Prayer, book of, in pocket, 162; for 
the dying, 137; unfruitful, 182, 207; 
sweet sacrifice, 205; Buckingham 
and, 146. 

Priests, 217. 

Princes, 177. 

Prison, compared to the world, 52. 

Prodigal, 51, 62 (see Parallels). 

Providence, The Tempest, 55. 

Puritans, IX. 

Purity, its shock at sin, 71. 

Quality of mercy, 194. 

Quarrel, 171, 203. 

Quickly, Mrs., quotes 23rd Psalm, 58. 

Recognition in Heaven, 155. 
Rectitude, 209. 

Redemption, Atonement, 213. 
Religious Vows and Oaths, 214. 
Religious Observances, Worship, 217. 
Religious Beliefs, Practices, Super- 
stitions, 218. 
Remorse, 221. 

Repentance, Penitence, 224. 
Responsibility, Man's, 186. 
Revenge, Curses Hate, 226. 

Ransom for man, 72, 213. 

Ravens, He that feeds them, ^3, 208. 

Redeemer, 111, 166, 213. 

Redemption by Christ's blood, 213 ; 

damned without, 228. 
Rees, on St. Paul's shipwreck, 55. 
Religious element in Shakspeare, why 

ignored, 3; blindness of literary 

world on, 19. 



286 



INDEX 



Rembrandt, 7, 10. 

Reputation, 211, 271. 

Retribution, 81. 

Rich man in heaven, 57; Lazarus and, 

59- 

Riches, 255, 260. 

Richard II, singular allusion to scrip- 
ture, 52. 

Richard III, 96; nemesis and, 82; the 
after-life and, in; not a sceptic, 97. 

Richmond, 98. 

Roderigo, 102. 

Romeo, courage not strong, 75. 

Romeo and Juliet and the after-life, 
no. 

Rosseau on Jesus and Socrates, 13. 

Ruskin, 9, 75, 80, 91. 

Ruth, 93. 

Salvation, 229. 

Santayana, 103. 

Satan, Devil, 230. 

Saviour, 166. 

Scriptures, 232. 

Sin, Sinners, 232. 

Sin, Insecurity and Effects of, 236. 

Sin, Tendency and Deceitfulness, 

237. 
Sinners, 232. 
Slander, Malice, 239. 
Sorrow, Grief, Sympathy, 241. 
Soul, 244. 
Suicide, 246. 
Superstitions, 218. 
Sympathy, 241. 

Sacrament, 217. 

Sacred writ, 232. 

Sacrifice, 12; of prayer, 205. 

Samson, 248. 

Santayana, article by quoted, 3. 

Saviour's, the world's need of its, 14. 

Savonarola, 13. 

Scherar, 104. 

Schlegel quoted, 53, 64, 74, 78, 80, 85, 

112. 
Scott, 9. 

Scripture and Shakspeare in 
Parallel Columns, 32. 



Parallel Passages — 

Peace makers, Word a lamp, God a 
rock, Destroy this temple, Fear 
not, Weak things chosen, Buy the 
truth, Good for evil, 33. 

Pray for enemies, Love believeth 
all, Chastening, Mote and the 
Beam, Slow to anger, Camel and 
the needle's eye, house divided, 
Baptism, All are sinners, The tree 
and the fruit, Sins that are scarlet, 

34- 

Salvation neglected, Life-saving and 
losing, Not justified by law, Candle 
under a bushel, Love and law, 
God's right hand, Everlasting joy, 
Bowels of mercy, Ministering 
spirits, Showers from heaven, 
Snow in harvest, Lord of Heaven 
and earth, 35. 

Asking and receiving not, Rude in 
speech — Paul, Signs of the times, 
Wisdom's voice in the street, God 
our witness, God in marriage, The 
spots of the leopard, A child for a 
king, Doing right and wrong, 
God's arm saves, The book of life, 
To everything a season, 36. 

Cedars of Lebanon, Baptism, Speak- 
ing by parable, Rich man and 
Lazarus, Barabbas preferred, Beel- 
zebub, Legions of Angels, The 
slaughter by Herod, Mothers weep- 
ing, Herod and the men of the 
east, Prodigal son, 37. 

Born blind, Sight and sin, No good 
things from Nazareth, Devils enter- 
ing swine, The betrayal, 38. 

Pilate's handwashing, Golgotha, 
Judgment, graves opened, Loving 
darkness, Death destroyed, Dust 
of death, Light in death, 39. 

The certainty of death, Brevity of 
life, Man's days a shadow, Long- 
ing for death, Days swifter than a 
shuttle, Death is gain, Dying daily, 
The fruit of chastening, Not by 
power, Prince of this world, The 
strait gate, Trust in princes, 40. 



INDEX 



287 



Good counsel, A good name, Count- 
ing the cost, Good words from 
good hearts, An evil tongue, A 
rolling stone, The sins of youth, A 
just balance, 41. 

Thorns and snares, The way of a 
fool, A wise man, Sin will find us 
out, Sins of fathers upon children, 
riches unsatisfying, The Leviathan, 
God's glory in the heavens, 42. 

Manna in the wilderness, Jacob's 
staff, Too much honey, False as 
water, Fear not, Temptation, 
Father against son, Vipers, Poison 
of adders, Tongues of serpents, 43. 

Dog to his vomit, Job's despair, The 
fat and the lean kine, A witch not 
to live, Satan an Angel of light, 
Lucifer fallen, Legion of devils. 
Satan quotes scripture, 44. 

Prince of the world, Slanderous as 
Satan, Poor as Job, Wounds of a 
friend, The righteous flourish, 
God's mercy on whom He will, 
The law against murder, Calling 
evil good, Mischief returns, Law 
against theft, Touching pitch de- 
fileth, 45. 

Living in danger, Bulls of Bashan, 
The law of inheritance, The ten 
commandments, Garden of Eden, 
Woman and the serpent, Fall of 
Adam, Birth of Cain, Murder of 
Abel, The voice of brother's blood, 
Curse of Cain, Noah and the Ark, 
46. 

The law of kinship, Flame and fire, 
A ruler must be just, Jacob and 
Laban, Jael, Samson's slaughter, 

47- 
Samson and the city gates, Jepth- 
thah's vow, Goliath's staff, David 
kills Goliath, The Queen of Sheba, 
The overheated furnace, Daniel to 
judgment, The marriage injunc- 
tion, 48. 
Scriptures, 25, 51, 56, 81, 09, 104, 117, 

144, 232. 
Selections for Scripture themes — 
method of, 117. 



Self-sacrificing, men are rarely, 14. 

Sermons in stones, 175, 196. 

Shakspeare, was he a Christian? VII; 
an orthodox believer, VII, XI educa- 
tion, personal faith, dependence 
upon Bible, X; Bible necessary to, 
God in, XII; Carlyle on, XIV, 80; 
greatness of works, 3; mystery of, 4; 
not a miracle, 5; authenticity of 
works, 5, 6; timeliness, 5; relation to 
stage, 6; scripture references not acci- 
dental, VII ; everything in, 8 ; univer- 
sality, 8, 51 ; discovered characters for 
all time, 9; not an iconoclast, 10; 
general knowledge of scripture, 51 ; 
interpretations of scripture, 27; Calv- 
anism in, 57 ; moral inculcation, 77, 8f 
heroes, 67, 68; heroines, 68, 75; i< 
male characters good and bad, 68; 
no religious framework in plays, 96; 
did not dramatize religion, 94, 103, 
immortality, 103-113; 131-138; genius 
in advance of reforms, 269; witness 
against strong drink, 270. 

Sharp, Prof. F. C, quoted, VI, 91, 102, 
107. 

Shepherd, happy life of, 192. 

Shylock, hatred and revenge partly 
justified, 68; Jacob, his saint and 
pattern, 62; Antonio not Christian to- 
ward, 61. 

Sin, judgment and, 83, 85, 117; brings 
its own punishment, 81 ; angels fell 
by, 119; not an accident, 74; hell- 
born, 163 ; none in heaven, 182 ; oath- 
breaking, 216; visited on children, 
235 J Eve's legacy, 235 ; three men of, 
222; a mocker, 232; some rise by, 
2 33 ', one provokes another, 237. 

Sinners, all are, 137, 232. 

Snider's commentaries quoted, 82, 95, 
99-102. 

Snow, 222, 239. 

Socrates, 13. 

Soldiers, 139, 259. 

Solomon, 12, 181, 248. 

Son, killed in battle by father, 259; 
should choose his own wife, 188. 

Sonnets, Christ in the, XL 



288 



INDEX 



Sparrow, fall of, 33 ; he that caters for, 
208. 

Sprague's notes quoted, 32. 

Stafford, Rev. Dr., sees good in Mac- 
beth, 91. 

Stage, religion cannot be portrayed by, 
103 ; Shakspeare wrote for, 6 ; all the 
world a, 185. 

Stars, men not ruled by, 186. 

Stephen, 93. 

Stones, known to move, 236. 

Strong, Dr., quoted, X, 77, 103. 

Strong drink, 273. 

Study, value of, 173- 

Sun, 181. 

Surfeiting worse than starving, 278. 

Temptation, 247. 

Tendency of Sin, 237. 

Testimony of the Dying, 249. 

Thankfulness, 203. 

Time, 174. 

Treason, Betrayal, Treachery, 249. 

Truth, 252. 

Tyranny, 198. 

Tailor, a drunken, 272. 

Taine, 78. 

Taming of the Shrew, and marriage, 

84. 
Teaching easier than practice, 124. 
Te Deum sung by choir, 217. 
Temperance, 277. 
Tempest, the, 54, 56. 
Tempted by the devil, 248. 
Tennyson, 53. 
Thackeray, 9. 

Thief, fear of an officer, 125. 
Tide in affairs of men, 208. 
Time, the Sonnets on, 178. 
Toothache, 201. 
Timon of Athens, 94. 
Tongue, envious, 201 ; slanderous, 241 ; 



Translation of Bible, IX, 27. 
Tragedies, a new lesson, 96. 
Trench, archbishop, 83. 
Troilus and Cressida, 94. 

Universality of Shakspeare, 51, 104; of 

religion in man, 104. 
Unkindness the only deformity, 196. 
Unfruitful prayer, 207. 
Unity of purpose in plays, 80. 

Virtue, Chastity, 253. 
Vows, 214. 

Vine, 202. 

Virgil, 103. 

Virgin, 189. 

Voyage of life, tide in, 208. 

War, 256. 

Wealth, Ill-gotten, Hoarded, 260. 

Woman, 261. 

World, 262. 

Worldly Honors and Glory, 264. 

Worship, 217. 

War, evils of, 258. 259. 

Ward, Artemus, 7. 

Way, truth, life, 14. 

Wesley, 13. 

Wheat, 200. 

White, Richard Grant, 64. 

Williams, 13. 

Will; Shakspeare's, XII, 113. 

Wine, a devil, 272. 

Wise men and Herod, 59. 

Wolsey, 86. 

Women of Shakspeare, 68, 69, 261. 

Wolf in lamb's skin, 143. 

Words make not prayer, 204. 

Yesterday, call it back, 174. 



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